8b 
TS 
1445 
.  R6 
1877 


53 


67  ■ 


Franklin  Institute  Library 


PHILADELPHIA 


Class  So.  3  3      Book  ^  'v*^  V  Accession 


Article  V. — The  Library  shall  be  divided  into  two  classes  ;  the  first 
comprising  such  works  as,  from  their  rarity  or  value,  should  not  be  lent 
„out,  all  unbound  periodicals,  and  such  text  books  as  ought  to  be  found 
in  a  library  of  reference  except  when  required  by  Committees  of  the 
Institute,  or  by  members  or  holders  of  second  class  stock,  who  have 
obtained  the  sanction  of  the  Committee.  The  second  class  shall  include 
those  books  intended  for  circulation. 

I  Article  VI. — The  Secretary  shall  have  authority  to  loan  to  Members 
and  to  holders  of  second  class  stock,  any  work  belonging  to  the  second 
CLAT3S,  subject  to  the  following  regulations: 

Section  1. — No  individual  shall  be  permitted  to  have  more  than  two 
books  out  at  one  time,  without  a  written  permission,  signed  by  at  least 
two  members  of  the  Library  Committe  ;  nor  shall  a  book  be  kept  out 
more  than  two  weeks  ;  but  if  no  one  has  applied  for  it,  the  former  bor- 
rower may  renew  the  loan.  Should  any  person  have  applied  for  it,  the 
latter  shall  have  the  preference. 

Section  2. — A  fine  of  ten  cents  per  week  shall  be  exacted  for  the 
detention  of  a  book  beyond  the  limited  time  ;  and  if  a  book  be  not  re- 
turned within  three  months  it  shall  be  deemed  lost,  and  the  borrower 
shall,  in  addition  to  his  fines,  forfeit  its  value. 

Section  3. — Should  any  book  be  returned  injured,  the  borrower  shall 
pay  for  the  injury,  or  replace  the  book,  as  the  Library  Committee  may 
direct ;  and  if  one  or  more  books,  belonging  to  a  set  or  sets,  be  lost,  the 
borrower  shall  replace  them  or  make  full  restitution. 

Article  VII. — Any  person  removing  from  the  Hall,  without  permis- 
sion from  the  proper  authorities,  any  book,  newspaper  or  other  property 
in  charge  of  the  Library  Committee,  shall  be  reported  to  the  Committee, 
who  may  inflict  any  fine  not  exceeding  twenty-five  dollars. 

Article  VIII. — No  member  or  holder  of  second  class  stock,  whose 
annual  contribution  for  the  current  year  shall  be  unpaid  or  who  is  in 
arrears  for  fines,  shall  be  entitled  to  the  privileges  of  the  Library  or 
Reading  Room. 

Article  IX. — If  any  member  or  holder  of  second  class  stock,  shall 
refuse  or  neglect  to  comply  with  the  foregoing  rules,  it  shall  be  the  duty 
of  the  Secretary  to  report  him  to  the  Committee  on  the  Library. 

Article  X. — Any  Member  or  holder  of  second  class  stock,  detected 
in  mutilating  the  newspapers,  pamphlets  or  books  belonging  to  the  Insti- 
tute shall  be  deprived  of  his  right  of  membership,  and  the  name  of  the 
offender  shall  be  made  public. 


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SOUTH  KENSINGTON  MUSEUM  ART  HANDBOOKS. 

Edited  by  WILLIAM  MASKELL. 

NO.  1. -TEXTILE  FABRICS. 


These  Hct7idbooks  are  reprints  of  the  prefaces  or  introductions  to 
the  large  catalogues  of  the  chief  divisions  of  works  of  art  in  the 
Museum  at  South  Kensington;  arranged  and  so  far  abridged  as  to 
bring  each  into  a  portable  shape.  The  Lords  of  the  Committee  of 
Council  on  Education  having  determined  on  the  publication  of 
them,  the  editor  trusts  that  they  will  meet  the  purpose  in- 
tended; namely,  to  be  useful,  not  alone  for  the  collections  at  South 
Kensington  but  for  other  collections,  by  enabling  the  public  at 
a  trifling  cost  to  understand  something  of  the  history  and  character 
of  the  subjects  treated  of. 

The  attthorities  referred  to  by  the  authors  will  be  found  named 
in  the  large  catalogues ;  where  are  also  given  detailed  descriptions  of 
the  very  numerous  examples  in  the  South  Kensington  Museum. 


n 


TEXTILE  FABRICS. 


BY 


THE  VERY  REV.  DANIEL  ROCK,  D.D. 


WITH     NUMEROUS  WOODCUTS. 


Published  for  the  Committee  of  Council  on  Education 

•-jW  BY 

SCRIBNER,  WELFORD,  AND  ARMSTRONG, 
NEW  YORK. 


THE  GETTY  CENTEh 
(LIBRARY 


LIST  OF  WOODCUTS. 


Riga 


Indian  woman  reeling  silk      .......<,.  13 

Ladies  in  fifteenth  century  spinning  and  weaving     .....  34 

Mortuary  cloth      ...........  44 

Silk  damask  with  imitated  Arabic  letters         ......  46 

Ladies  in  fourteenth  century  carding  and  spinning    .....  48 

Byzantine  Dalmatic       .                                                          .       .  51 

Sicilian  silk  damask       ..........  57 

Florentine  silk  damask   .       .       .       .       .       .       ...  '    .       .       .  62, 

Part  of  the  Syon  Cope   .       .       ........  84 

Embroidered  saddle-cloth       .       .       .       .       .       .       .       .       .  87 

Ancient  banner  of  the  city  of  Strasburg  .       .       .       .       .       .       .  91 

Banner  of  the  tapestry  workers  of  Lyons  .       .       .       .       .       .       .  97 

Tapestry  of  the  fourteenth  century                                              .       .  98 

The  weaver,  in  1 5  74  .       .       .       .       .       .       .       .  .100 

Tapestry  of  the  fifteenth  century   102 

State  gloves  of  Louis  the  thirteenth        .              .       .       .       .  11: 


^  ^  "5  ^3 


r»  <v  nt 


TEXTILES. 


CHAPTER  I. 


Under  its  widest  acceptation  the  word  "  textile "  means  every 
kind  of  stuff,  no  matter  its  material,  wrought  in  the  loom. 
AVhether,  therefore,  the  threads  are  spun  from  the  produce  of  the 
animal,  vegetable,  or  mineral  kingdom ;  whether  of  sheep's  wool, 
goats'  hair,  camels'  wool,  or  camels'  hair  ;  whether  of  flax,  hemp, 
mallow,  or  the  filaments  drawn  out  of  the  leaves  of  plants  of  the 
lily  and  asphodel  tribes  of  flowers,  or  the  fibrous  coating  about 
pods,  or  cotton ;  whether  of  gold,  silver,  or  of  any  other  metal ; 
the  webs  from  all  such  materials  are  textiles.  Unlike  these  are 
other  appliances  for  garment-making  in  many  countries  ;  and  of 
such  materials  not  the  least  curious,  if  not  odd  to  our  ideas, 
is  paper,  which  is  so  much  employed  for  the  purpose  by  the 
Japanese.  A  careful  reference  to  a  map  of  the  world  will  show 
us  the  materials  which  from  the  earliest  ages  the  inhabitants  of 
the  world  had  at  hand,  in  every  clime,  for  making  articles  of 
dress. 

In  all  the  colder  regions  the  well-furred  skins  of  several 
families  of  beasts  could,  by  the  ready  help  of  a  thorn  for  a 
needle  and  of  the  animal's  own  sinews  for  thread,  be  fashioned 
after  a  manner  into  various  kinds  of  clothing. 


B 


2 


TEXTILES. 


Sheep,  in  a  primitive  period,  were  bred  for  raiment  perhaps  as 
much  as  for  food.  At  first,  the  locks  of  wool  torn  away  from  the 
animal's  back  by  brambles  were  gathered  :  afterwards  shearing 
was  thought  of  and  followed  in  some  countries,  while  in  others 
the  wool  was  not  cut  off  but  plucked  by  the  hand  away  from  the 
living  creature.  Obtained  by  either  method  the  fleeces  were 
spun  generally  by  women  from  the  distaff.  This  very  ancient 
daily  work  was  followed  by  women  among  our  Anglo-saxon 
ancestors  of  all  ranks  of  life,  from  the  king's  daughter  downwards. 
Spinning  from  a  distaff  is  even  now  common  in  many  countries 
on  the  continent,  particularly  so  all  through  Italy.  Long  ago 
the  name  of  spindle-tree  was  given  in  England  to  the  Euonymus 
plant,  on  account  of  the  good  spindles  which  its  wood  affords : 
and  the  term  "  spinster"  as  meaning  every  unmarried  woman  even 
of  the  gentlest  blood  is  derived  from  the  same  occupation. 
Every  now  and  then  from  the  graves  in  which  women  of  the 
British  and  succeeding  epochs  were  buried,  are  picked  up  the 
elaborately  ornamented  leaden  whorls  which  were  fastened  at  the 
lower  end  of  their  spindles  to  give  them  a  due  weight  and  steadi- 
ness. 

A  curious  instance  of  the  use  of  woollen  stuff  not  woven  but 
plaited,  among  the  older  stock  of  the  Britons,  was  very  lately 
brought  to  light  while  cutting  through  an  early  Celtic  grave-hill  or 
barrow  in  Yorkshire  :  the  dead  body  had  been  wrapped,  as  was 
shown  by  the  few  unrotted  shreds  still  cleaving  to  its  bones,  in  a 
woollen  shroud  of  coarse  and  loose  fabric  wrought  by  the  plaiting 
process  without  a  loom. 

As  time  passed  by  it  brought  the  loom,  fashioned  after  its 
simplest  form,  to  the  far  west,  and  its  use  became  general 
throughout  the  British  islands.  The  art  of  dyeing  soon  followed  ; 
and  so  beautiful  were  the  tints  which  our  Britons  knew  how 
to  give  to  their  wools  that  strangers  wondered  at  and  were 
jealous  of  their  splendour.  A  strict  rule  limited  the  colour  of  the 
official  dress  assigned  to  each  of  the  three  ranks  into  which  the 


TEXTILES. 


3 


bardic  order  was  distinguished  to  one  simple  unbroken  shade : 
spotless  white,  symbolic  of  sunlight  and  holiness,  for  the  druid  or 
priest ;  sky-blue,  emblem  of  peace,  for  the  bard  or  poet ;  and 
green,  the  livery  of  the  wood  and  field,  for  the  teacher  of  the  sup- 
posed qualities  of  herbs  and  leech-craft.  Postulants,  again,  asking 
leave  to  be  admitted  into  either  rank  were  recognized  by  the  robe 
barred  with  stripes  of  white,  blue,  and  green,  which  they  had  to 
wear  during  the  term  of  their  initiation.  With  regard  to  the  bulk 
of  the  people,  we  learn  from  Dion  Cassius  (born  a.d.  155)  that 
the  garments  worn  by  them  were  of  a  texture  wrought  in  a  square 
pattern  of  several  colours ;  and,  speaking  of  Boadicea,  the  same 
writer  tells  us  that  she  usually  had  on,  under  her  cloak,  a  motley 
tunic  chequered  all  over  with  many  colours.  This  garment  we 
are  fairly  warranted  in  deeming  to  have  been  a  native  stuff,  woven 
of  worsted  after  a  pattern  in  tints  and  design  like  one  or  other 
of  the  present  Scotch  plaids.  Pliny,  who  seems  to  have  gathered 
a  great  deal  of  his  natural  history  from  scraps  of  hearsay,  most 
likely  included  these  ancient  sorts  of  British  textiles  with  those 
from  Gaul,  when  he  tells  us  that  to  weave  with  a  good  number  of 
threads,  so  as  to  work  the  cloths  called  polymita,  was  first  taught 
in  Alexandria  ;  to  divide  by  checks,  in  Gaul. 

The  native  botanical  home  of  cotton  is  in  the  east.  India 
almost  everywhere  throughout  her  wide-spread  countries  arrayed, 
as  she  still  arrays,  herself  in  cotton,  gathered  from  a  plant  of  the 
mallow  family  which  has  its  wild  growth  there ;  and  in  the  same 
vegetable  produce  the  lower  orders  of  people  dwelling  still  further 
to  the  east  also  clothed  themselves. 

Hemp,  a  plant  of  the  nettle  tribe  and  called  by  botanists 
"  cannabis  sativa,"  was  of  old  well  known  in  the  far  north  of 
Germany  and  throughout  the  ancient  Scandinavia.  More  than 
two  thousand  years  ago  we  find  it  thus  spoken  of  by  Herodotus  : 
"  Hemp  grows  in  the  country  of  the  Scythians,  which,  except  in 
the  thickness  and  height  of  the  stalk,  very  much  resembles  flax ; 
in  the  qualities  mentioned,  however,  the  hemp  is  much  superior. 

b  2 


4 


TEXTILES, 


It  grows  in  a  wild  state,  and  is  also  cultivated.  The  Thracians 
malse  clothing  of  it  very  like  linen  cloth  ;  nor  could  any  person, 
without  being  very  well  acquainted  with  the  substance,  say 
whether  this  clothing  is  made  of  hemp  or  flax."  From  "  can- 
nabis," its  name  in  Latin,  we  have  taken  our  word  "canvas,"  to 
mean  any  texture  woven  of  hempen  thread. 

Although  flax  is  to  be  found  growing  wild  in  many  parts  of 
Great  Britain,  it  is  very  .  doubtful  whether  for  many  ages  our 
British  forefathers  were  aware  of  the  use  of  this  plant  for  clothing 
purposes  :  they  would  otherwise  have  left  behind  them  some  shred 
of  linen  in  one  or  other  of  their  many  graves.  Following,  as  they 
did,  the  usage  of  being  buried  in  the  best  of  the  garments  they 
were  accustomed  to,  or  most  loved  when  alive,  their  bodies 
would  have  been  found  dressed  in  some  small  article  of  linen 
texture,  had  they  ever  worn  it. 

We  must  go  to  the  valley  of  the  Nile  if  we  wish  to  learn  the 
earliest  history  of  the  finest  flaxen  textiles.  Time  out  of  mind  the 
Egyptians  were  famous  as  well  for  the  growth  of  flax  as  for  the 
beautiful  linen  which  they  wove  out  of  it,  and  which  became  to 
them  a  most  profitable,  because  so  widely  sought  for,  article 
of  commerce.  Their  own  word  "byssus"  for  the  plant  itself 
became  among  the  Greeks,  and  afterwards  among  the  Latin 
nations,  the  term  for  linens  wrought  in  Egyptian  looms.  Long 
before  the  oldest  book  in  the  world  was  written,  the  tillers  of  the 
ground  all  over  Egypt  had  been  heedful  in  sowing  flax,  and 
anxious  about  its  harvest.  It  was  one  of  their  staple  crops,  and 
hence  was  it  that,  in  punishment  of  Pharaoh,  the  hail  plague 
which  at  the  bidding  of  Moses  fell  from  heaven  destroyed 
throughout  the  land  the  flax  just  as  it  was  getting  ripe.  Flax 
grew  also  upon  the  banks  of  the  Jordan,  and  in  Judaea  generally  j 
and  the  women  of  the  country,  like  Rahab,  carefully  dried  it 
when  pulled,  and  stacked  it  for  future  hackling  upon  the  roofs  of 
their  houses.  Nevertheless,  it  was  from  Egypt,  as  Solomon  hints, 
that  the  Jews  had  to  draw  their  fine  linen.    At  a  later  period, 


TEXTILES.  A 

among  the  woes  foretold  to  Egypt,  the  prophet  Isaiah  wa^pfl  her 
that  "  they  shall  be  confounded  who  wrought  in  combing 
weaving  fine  linen. " 

How  far  the  reputation  of  Egyptian  workmanship  in  the  craft 
of  the  loom  had  spread  abroad  is  shown  us  by  the  way  in  which, 
besides  sacred,  heathenish  antiquity  has  spoken  of  it.  Herodotus 
says,  "  Amasis  king  of  Egypt  gave  to  the  Minerva  of  Lindus  a 
linen  corslet  well  worthy  of  inspection  : "  and  further  on,  speaking 
of  another  corslet  which  Amasis  had  sent  the  Lacedaemonians, 
he  observes  that  it  was  of  linen  and  had  a  vast  number  of  figures 
of  animals  inwoven  into  its  fabric,  and  was  likewise  embroidered 
with  gold  and  tree-wool.  This  last  was  especially  to  be  admired 
because  each  of  the  twists,  although  of  fine  texture,  contained 
within  it  360  threads,  all  of  them  clearly  visible. 

But  we  have  material  as  well  as  written  proofs  at  hand  to  show 
the  excellence  of  old  Egyptian  work  in  linen.  During  late  years 
many  mummies  have  been  brought  to  this  country  from  Egypt,  and 
the  narrow  bandages  with  which  they  were  found  to  have  been  so 
admirably  and,  according  even  to  our  modern  requirements  of 
chirurgical  fitness,  so  artistically  swathed  have  been  unwrapped. 
These  bandages  are  often  so  fine  in  their  texture  as  fully  to  verify 
the  praises  of  old  bestowed  upon  the  beauty  of  the  Egyptian 
loom-work.  We  learn  from  Sir  Gardiner  Wilkinson  that  "  the  finest 
piece  of  mummy-cloth,  sent  to  England  by  Mr.  Salt,  and  now  in 
the  British  museum,  of  linen,  appears  to  be  made  of  yarns  of 
nearly  100  hanks  in  the  pound,  with  140  threads  in  an  inch  in  the 
warp  and  about  64  in  the  woof."  Another  piece  of  linen,  which 
the  same  distinguished  traveller  obtained  at  Thebes,  has  152 
threads  in  the  warp  and  7 1  in  the  woof. 

Although  from  all  antiquity  upwards,  till  within  some  few  years 
back,  the  unbroken  belief  had  been  that  such  mummy-clothing 
was  undoubtedly  made  of  linen  woven  out  of  pure  unmixed  flax, 
some  writers  led,  or  rather  misled,  by  a  few  stray  words  in 
Herodotus  (speaking  of  the  corslet  of  Amasis,  quoted  just  now; 


6 


TEXTILES, 


took  that  historian  to  mean  wool,  and  argued  that  Egyptian 
textiles  wrought  a  thousand  years  before  were  mixed  with  cotton. 
While  the  question  was  agitated,  specimens  of  mummy-cloth  were 
submitted  to  the  judgment  of  several  persons  in  the  weaving 
trade  deemed  most  competent  to  speak  upon  the  matter.  Helped 
only  by  the  fingers'  feel  and  the  naked  eye,  some  among  them 
agreed  that  such  textures  were  really  woven  of  cotton.  This 
opinion  was  but  shortlived.  Other  individuals,  more  philo- 
sophical, went  to  work  on  a  better  path.  In  the  first  place  they 
clearly  learned,  through  the  microscope,  the  exact  and  never- 
varying  physical  structure  of  both  these  vegetable  substances. 
They  found  cotton  to  be  in  its  fibre  a  transparent  tube  without 
joints,  flattened  so  that  its  inward  surfaces  are  in  contact  along 
its  axis  and  also  twisted  spirally  round  its  axis ;  flax  on  the  con- 
trary is  a  transparent  tube,  jointed  like  a  cane  and  not  flattened 
or  twisted  spirally.  Examined  in  the  same  way,  old  samples  of 
byssus  or  mummy-bandages  from  Egypt  in  every  instance  were 
ascertained  to  be  of  fine  unmixed  flaxen  linen. 


CHAPTER  II. 


For  many  reasons  the  history  of  silk  is  not  only  curious  but 
highly  interesting.  In  the  earliest  ages  even  its  existence  was 
unknown,  and  when  discovered  the  knowledge  of  it  stole  forth 
from  the  far  east,  and  straggled  westward  very  slowly.  For  all 
that  lengthened  period  during  which  their  remarkable  civilization 
lasted,  the  older  Egyptians  probably  never  saw  silk  :  neither  they, 
nor  the  Israelites,  nor  any  other  of  the  most  ancient  kingdoms  of 
the  earth,  knew  of  it  in  any  shape,  either  as  a  simple  twist  or 
as  a  woven  stuff.  Not  the  smallest  shred  of  silk  has  hitherto 
been  found  in  the  tombs  or  amid  the  ruins  of  the  Pharaonic 
period. 

No  where  does  Holy  Writ,  old  or  new,  tell  anything  of  silk 
but  in  one  single  place,  the  Apocalypse  xviii.  12.  It  is  true  that 
in  the  English  authorized  version  we  read  of  "silk"  as  if  spoken 
of  by  Ezekiel  xvi.  10,  13;  and  again,  in  Proverbs  xxxi.  22  ;  yet 
there  can  be  no  doubt  that  in  both  these  passages,  the  word  silk 
is  wrong  through  the  translators  misunderstanding  the  original 
Hebrew.  The  Hebrew  word  is  not  so  rendered  in  any  ancient 
version :  and  the  best  Hebraists  have  decided  that  silk  was  not 
known  by  the  old  Israelites.  When  St.  John  speaks  of  it  he 
includes  it  with  the  gold,  and  silver,  and  precious  stones,  and 
pearls,  and  fine  linen  and  purple  which,  with  many  other  costly 
freights,  merchants  were  wont  to  bring  to  Rome. 

It  was  long  after  the  days  of  Ezekiel  that  silk  in  its  raw  form 


8  -  TEXTILES. 

'     :s  V   '  jt 

only,  made,  up  into  hanks,  first  found  its  way  to  Egypt,  western 
Asia,  and:  eastern  Europe. 

We  owe  to  Aristotle  the  earliest  notice  of  the  silk-worm,  and 
although  his  account  be  incorrect  it  has  much  value,  because 
he  gives  us  information  about  the  original  importation  of  raw  silk 
into  the  western  world.  Brought  from  China  through  India  the 
silk  came  by  water  across  the  Arabian  ocean,  up  the  Red  Sea,  and 
thence  over  the  isthmus  of  Suez  (or  perhaps  rather  by  the  over- 
land route,  through  Persia)  to  the  small  but  commercial  island  of 
Cos,  lying  off  the  coast  of  Asia  minor.  Pamphile,  the  daughter 
of  Plates,  is  reported  to  have  first  woven  silk  in  Cos.  Here, 
by  female  hands,  were  wrought  those  light  thin  gauzes  which 
became  so  fashionable ;  these  were  stigmatized  by  some  of  the 
Latin  poets,  as  well  as  by  heathen  moralists,  as  anything  but 
seemly  for  women's  wear.  Tibullus  speaks  of  them ;  and  Seneca 
condemns  them :  "I  behold "  he  says  "  silken  garments,  if  gar- 
ments they  can  be  called,  which  are  a  protection  neither  for  the 
body  nor  for  shame."  Later  still,  and  in  the  Christian  era,  we 
have  an  echo  to  the  remarks  of  Seneca  in  the  words  of  Solinus : 
"  This  is  silk,  in  which  at  first  women  but  now  even  men  have 
been  led,'  by  their  cravings  after  luxury,  to  show  rather  than  to 
clothe  their  bodies." 

Looking  over  very  ancient  manuscripts  we  often  find  between 
richly  gilt  illuminations,  to  keep  them  from  harm  or  being  hurt 
through  the  rubbings  of  the  next  leaf,  a  covering  of  the  thinnest 
gauze,  just  as  we  now  put  sheets  of  silver  paper  for  that  purpose 
over  engravings.  It  is  not  impossible  that  some  at  least  of  these 
may  be  shreds  from  the  translucent  textiles  which  found  favour  in 
the  world  for  so  long  a  time  during  the  classic  period.  The 
curious  example  of  such  gauzy  interleafings  in  the  manuscript  of 
Theodulph,  now  at  Puy  en  Velay,  will  occur  perhaps  to  more 
than  one  of  our  readers. 

It  may  be  easily  imagined  that  silken  garments  were  brought, 
at  an  early  period,  to  imperial  Rome.    Not  only,  however,  were 


TEXTILES,  I  V*. 

\v  ^. 

the  prices  asked  for  them  so  high  that  few  could  afijd^^.  t5 Jbuy 
such  robes  for  their  wives  and  daughters,  but,  at  first,\th£y  Wfepe 
looked  upon  as  quite  unbecoming  for  men's  wear ;  heriee,^J?y  & 
law  of  the  Roman  senate  under  Tiberius,  it  was  enacted  :  ^Ne- 
vestis  serica  vicos  fcedaret."  While  noticing  how  womanish 
Caligula  became  in  his  dress  Suetonius  remarks  his  silken  attire  : 
"Aliquando  sericatus  et  cycladatus."  An  exception  was  made 
by  some  emperors  for  very  great  occasions,  and  both  Titus  and 
Vespasian  wore  dresses  of  silk  when  they  celebrated  at  Rome 
their  triumph  over  Judaea.  Heliogabalus  was  the  first  emperor 
who  wore  whole  silk  for  clothing.  Aurelian,  on  the  other  hand, 
neither  had  himself  in  his  wardrobe  a  garment  wholly  silk  nor 
gave  one  to  be  worn  by  another.  When  his  own  wife  begged  him 
to  allow  her  to  have  a  single  mantle  of  purple  silk  he  replied, 
"  Far  be  it  from  us  to  allow  thread  to  be  reckoned  worth  its  weight 
in  gold."  For  then  a  pound  of  gold  was  the  price  of  a  pound  of 
silk. 

Clothing  made  wholly  or  in  part  out  of  silk,  nevertheless, 
became  every  year  more  and  more  sought  for.  So  remunerative 
was  the  trade  of  weaving  the  raw  material  into  its  various  forms, 
that,  by  the  revised  code  of  laws  for  the  Roman  empire  published 
a.d.  533,  a  monopoly  in  it  was  given  to  the  court,  and  looms 
worked  by  women  were  set  up  in  the  imperial  palace.  Thus 
Byzantium  became  and  long  continued  famous  for  the  beauty 
of  its  silken  stuffs.  Still,  the  raw  silk  itself  had  to  be  brought 
thither  from  abroad ;  until  two  Greek  monks,  who  had  lived  many 
years  among  the  Chinese,  learnt  the  whole  process  of  rearing  the 
worm.  Returning,  they  brought  with  them  a  number  of  eggs 
hidden  in  their  walking-staves ;  and,  carrying  them  to  Constanti- 
nople, they  presented  these  eggs  to  the  emperor  who  gladly 
received  them.  When  hatched  the  worms  were  distributed  over 
Greece  and  Asia  minor,  and  very  soon  the  western  world  reared 
its  own  silk.  In  some  places,  at  least  in  Greece,  the  weaving  not 
only  of  the  finer  kinds  of  cloth  but  of  silk  fell  into  the  hands  of 


TEXTILES. 


the  Jews.  Benjamin  of  Tudela,  writing  in  1161,  tells  us  that  the 
city  of  Thebes  contained  about  two  thousand  Jewish  inhabitants. 
' '  These  are  the  most  eminent  manufacturers  of  silk  and  purple 
cloth  in  all  Greece." 

South  Italy  wrought  rich  silken  stuffs  by  the  end  of  the 
eleventh  century ;  for  we  are  told  by  our  countryman  Ordericus 
Vitalis,  who  died  in  the  first  half  of  the  twelfth  century,  that 
Mainerius,  the  abbot  of  St.  Evroul  at  Uzey  in  Normandy,  on 
coming  home  brought  with  him  from  Apulia  several  large  pieces 
of  silk,  and  gave  to  his  church  four  of  the  finest  ones,  with  which 
four  copes  were  made  for  the  chanters. 

From  a  feeling  alive  in  the  middle  ages  throughout  the  length 
and  breadth  of  Christendom,  that  the  best  of  all  things  ought  to 
be  given  for  the  service  of  the  Church,  the  garments  of  its  cele- 
brating priesthood  were,  if  not  always,  at  least  very  often  wholly 
of  silk ;  holosericus.  Owing  to  this  fact,  we  are  now  able  to 
learn  from  the  few  but  tattered  shreds  before  us  what  elegantly 
designed  and  gorgeous  stuffs  the  foreign  mediaeval  loom  could 
weave,  and  what  beautiful  embroidery  our  own  countrywomen 
knew  so  well  how  to  work.  These  specimens  help  us  also  to 
rightly  understand  the  description  of  the  splendid  vestments 
enumerated  with  such  exactness  in  the  old  inventories  of  our 
cathedrals  and  parish  churches,  as  well  as  in  the  early  wardrobe 
accompts  of  our  kings,  and  in  the  wills  and  bequests  of  dignified 
ecclesiastics  and  nobility. 

Coming  westward  among  us,  these  much  coveted  stuffs  brought 
with  them  the  several  names  by  which  they  were  commonly  known 
throughout  the  east,  whether  Greece,  Asia  minor,  or  Persia. 
Hence  when  we  read  of  samit,  ciclatoun,  cendal,  baudekin,  and 
other  such  terms  unknown  to  trade  now-a-days,  we  should  bear 
in  mind  that,  notwithstanding  the  wide  variety  of  spelling  which 
each  of  these  appellations  has  run  through,  we  arrive  at  their 
true  derivations,  and  discover  in  what  country  and  by  whose 
hands  they  were  wrought. 


TEXTILES.  11 

UP  ' 

As  commerce  grew  these  fine  silken  textiles  were  brougn|^to. 
our  markets,  and  articles  of  dress  were  made  of  silk  for  men's  W  \ 
well  as  women's  wear  among  the  wealthy.  At  what  period  the"* 
raw  material  came  to  be  imported  here,  not  so  much  for  embroi- 
dery as  to  be  wrought  in  the  loom,  we  do  not  exactly  know ;  but 
from  several  sides  we  learn  that  our  countrywomen  of  all  degrees, 
in  very  early  times,  busied  themselves  in  weaving.  Among  the 
home  occupations  of  maidens  St.  Aldhelm,  at  the  end  of  the 
seventh  century,  includes  weaving.  In  the  council  at  Cloveshoo, 
in  747,  nuns  are  exhorted  to  spend  their  time  in  reading  or  singing 
psalms  rather  than  weaving  and  knitting  vainglorious  garments  of 
many  colours.  By  that  curious  old  English  book  the  i  Ancren 
Riwle,'  written  towards  the  end  of  the  twelfth  century,  ankresses 
are  forbidden  to  make  purses  or  blodbendes  (which  were  narrow 
strips  to  bind  round  the  arm  after  bleeding),  to  gain  friends  there- 
with. Were  it  not  that  the  weaving  especially  of  silk  was  so 
generally  followed  in  the  cloister  by  English  women,  it  had  been 
useless  to  have  so  strongly  discountenanced  the  practice. 

But  on  silk  weaving  by  our  women  in  small  hand-looms  a 
very  important  witness,  especially  about  several  curious  specimens 
in  the  great  collection  at  South  Kensington,  is  John  Garland, 
born  at  the  beginning  of  the  thirteenth  century  in  London,  where 
many  of  his  namesakes  were  and  are  still  known.  First,  a  John 
Garland,  in  1170,  held  a  prebend's  stall  in  St.  Paul's  cathedral. 
Another  was  sheriff  at  a  later  period.  A  third,  a  wealthy  draper 
of  London,  gave  freely  towards  the  building  of  a  church  in  Somer- 
setshire. A  fourth,  who  died  in  1461,  lies  buried  in  St.  Sythe's; 
and,  at  the  present  day,  no  fewer  than  twenty-two  tradesmen  of 
that  name,  of  whom  six  are  merchants  of  high  standing  in  the 
city,  are  mentioned  in  the  London  post  office  directory  for  the 
year  1868.  We  give  these  instances  as  some  have  tried  to  rob  us 
of  John  Garland  by  saying  he  was  not  an  Englishman,  though  he 
has  himself  told  us  he  was  "  born  in  England  and  brought  up  in 
France.'1 


12  ,r/V  TEXTILES. 
\  j 

•  ' " Jn  a  kind  of  short  dictionary  drawn  up  by  that  writer  and 
-printed  at  the  end  of  '  Paris  sous  Philippe  le  Bel,'  edited  by  M. 
Geraud,  our  countryman  tells  us  that,  besides  the  usual  homely 
textiles,  costly  cloth-of-gold  webs  were  wrought  by  women ;  and 
very  likely,  among  their  other  productions,  were  those  blodbendes 
"  cingula  "  the  weaving  of  which  had  been  forbidden  to  ankresses 
and  nuns.  Perhaps,  also,  some  of  the  narrow  gold-wrought 
ribbons  in  the  South  Kensington  collection,  nos.  1233,  1256, 
1270,  8569,  etc.,  may  have  been  so  employed. 

John  Garland's  "  cingula  "  may  also  mean  the  rich  girdles  or 
sashes  worn  by  women  round  the  waist,  of  which  there  is  one 
example  in  the  same  collection,  no.  8571.  Of  this  sort  is  that 
fine  border,  amber  coloured  silk  and  diapered,  round  a  vestment 
found  in  a  grave  at  Durham ;  which  is  described  by  Mr.  Raine 
in  his  book  about  St.  Cuthbert  as  "  a  thick  lace,  one  inch  and  a 
quarter  broad — evidently  owing  its  origin,  not  to  the  needle,  but 
to  the  loom.',  In  an  after  period  the  same  bands  are  shown  on 
statuary,  and  in  the  illuminated  manuscripts  of  the  thirteenth 
century  :  as  instances  of  the  narrow  girdle,  the  effigy  of  a  lady  in 
Romney  church,  Hants  and  of  Ann  of  Bohemia  in  Westminster 
abbey  may  be  referred  to  ;  both  to  be  found  in  Hollis's  monu- 
mental effigies  of  Great  Britain ;  for  the  band  about  the  head, 
the  examples  in  the  wood-cuts  in  Planche's  British  costumes, 
p.  116. 

Specimens  of  such  head  bands  may  be  seen  at  South  Ken- 
sington, nos.  8569,  8583,  8584,  and  8585. 

They  are,  no  doubt,  the  old  snod  of  the  Anglo-saxon  period. 
For  ladies  they  were  wrought  of  silk  and  gold ;  women  of  lower 
degree  wore  them  of  simpler  stuff.  The  silken  snood,  used  in 
our  own  time  by  young  unmarried  women  in  Scotland,  is  a  truthful 
witness  to  the  fashion  in  vogue  during  Anglo-saxon  and  later  ages 
in  this  country. 

The  breeding  of  the  worm  and  the  manufacture  of  its  silk 
spread  themselves  with  steady  though  slow  steps  over  most  of  the 


TEXTILES. 

countries  which  border  on  the  shores  of  the  Mediterraneariyj-fs 
that,  by  the  tenth  century,  those  processes  had  reached  from 
far  east  to  the  uttermost  western  limits  of  that  sea.  Even  then, 
and  a  long  time  after,  the  natural  history  of  the  silkworm  became 
known  but  to  a  very  few.  Our  countryman  Alexander  Neckham, 
abbot  of  Cirencester  a  d.  1213,  was  probably  the  first  who  tried 
to  help  others  to  understand  the  habits  of  the  insect :  his  brief 
explanation  may  be  found  in  his  once  popular  book  6  De  natura 
rerum,'  which  has  been  lately  reprinted  by  order  of  the  Master 
of  the  Rolls. 


Indian  woman  reeling  silk  from  a  wheel. 


CHAPTER  III. 


Of  the  several  raw  materials  which  from  the  earliest  periods  have 
been  employed  in  weaving,  though  not  in  such  frequency  as  silk, 
one  is  gold :  which,  when  judiciously  brought  in,  adds  not  a 
barbaric  but  artistical  richness. 

The  earliest  written  notice  which  we  have  about  the  employ- 
ment of  this  precious  metal  in  the  loom,  or  of  the  way  in  which 
it  was  wrought  for  such  a  purpose,  is  in  the  Pentateuch.  Among 
the  sacred  vestments  made  for  Aaron  was  an  ephod  of  gold,  violet, 
and  purple,  and  scarlet  twice  dyed,  and  fine  twisted  linen,  with 
embroidered  work ;  and  the  workman  cut  also  thin  plates  of  gold 
and  drew  them  small  into  strips,  that  they  might  be  twisted  with 
the  woof  of  the  aforesaid  colours.  Instead  of  "  strip,"  the  autho- 
rised protestant  version  says  "  wire ; "  the  Douay  translation 
reads  "  thread : "  but  neither  can  be  right,  for  both  of  these 
English  words  mean  a  something  round  or  twisted  in  the  shape 
given  to  the  gold  before  being  wove,  whereas  the  metal  must  have 
been  worked  in  quite  flat,  as  we  learn  from  the  text. 

The  use  of  gold  for  weaving,  both  with  linen  or  by  itself, 
existed  almost  certainly  among  the  Egyptians  long  before  the 
days  of  Moses.  The  psalmist  describing  the  dress  of  the  king's 
daughter  (that  is,  Pharaoh's  daughter),  not  only  speaks  of  her 
being  "  in  raiment  of  needlework  "  but  that  "  her  clothing  is  of 
wrought  gold."    In  order  to  be  woven  the  precious  metal  was  at 


TEXTILES,  X   ,  ^o>i5  '  > 

vs.   <^>  V v 

first  wrought  in  a  flattened,  never  in  a  round  or  wire  sha^e;^  Tor  \  r-*\ 
this  hour  the  Chinese  and  the  people  of  India  work  the  gol4^}^o     ^  J 
their  stuffs  after  the  ancient  form.    In  the  same  fashion,  even  ric 
the  Italians  weave  their  lama  d'oro,  or  the  more  glistening  toca  : 
those  cloths  of  gold  which  to  all  Asiatic  and  many  European 
eyes  do  not  glare  with  too  much  garishness,  but  shine  with  a  glow 
that  befits  the  raiment  of  personages  in  high  station. 

Among  the  nations  of  ancient  Asia  garments  made  of  webs 
dyed  with  the  costly  purple  tint,  and  interwoven  with  gold,  were 
on  all  grand  occasions  worn  by  kings  and  princes.  So  celebrated 
did  the  Medes  and  Persians  become  in  such  works  of  the  loom, 
that  cloths  of  extraordinary  beauty  got  their  several  names  from 
those  peoples,  and  Medean,  Lydian,  and  Persian  textiles  were 
everywhere  sought  for. 

Writing  of  the  wars  carried  on  in  Asia  and  India  by  Alexander 
the  great  almost  four  centuries  before  the  birth  of  Christ,  Quintus 
Curtius  often  speaks  about  the  purple  and  gold  garments  worn  by 
the  Persians  and  more  eastern  Asiatics.  Among  the  many  thou- 
sands of  those  who  came  forth  from  Damascus  to  the  Greek  gene- 
ral, Parmenio,  numbers  were  so  clad  :  "  They  wore  robes  splen- 
did with  gold  and  purple."  All  over  India  the  same  fashion  was 
followed  in  dress.  When  an  Indian  king  with  his  two  sons  came 
to  Alexander,  the  three  were  so  arrayed.  Princes  and  the  high 
nobility,  all  over  the  east,  are  called  by  Quintus  Curtius  "pur- 
purati.';  Not  only  garments  but  hangings  were  made  of  the  same 
costly  fabric.  When  Alexander  wished  to  give  some  ambassadors, 
a  splendid  reception,  the  golden  couches  upon  which  they  lay  to 
eat  their  meat  were  screened  with  cloths  of  gold  and  purple ;  and 
the  Indian  guests  themselves  were  not  less  gorgeously  clothed  in 
their  own  national  costume,  as  they  came  wearing  linen  (perhaps 
cotton)  garments  equally  resplendent. 

The  dress  worn  by  Darius,  as  he  went  forth  to  do  battle,  is- 
thus  described  by  the  same  historian  :  "  the  waist  part  of  the 
royal  purple  tunic  was  wove  in  white,  and  upon  his  mantle  of 


i6 


TEXTILES. 


cloth  of  gold  were  figured  two  golden  hawks  as  if  pecking  at  one 
"^another  with  their  beaks." 

From  the  east  this  love  for  cloth  of  gold  reached  the  southern 
end  of  Italy,  and  thence  soon  got  to  Rome ;  where,  even  under 
its  early  kings,  garments  made  of  it  were  worn.  Pliny,  speak- 
ing of  this  rich  textile,  says  :  "gold  may  be  spun  or  woven  like 
wool,  without  any  wool  being  mixed  with  it."  We  are  told  by 
Verrius  that  Tarquinius  Priscus  rode  in  triumph  in  a  tunic  of  gold ; 
and  Agrippina  the  wife  of  the  emperor  Claudius,  when  he  exhi- 
bited the  spectacle  of  a  naval  combat,  sat  by  him  covered  with  a 
robe  made  entirely  of  gold  woven  without  any  other  material. 
About  the  year  1840  the  marquis  Campagna  dug  up  near  Rome 
two  old  graves,  in  one  of  which  had  been  buried  a  Roman  lady 
of  high  birth,  inferred  from  the  circumstance  that  all  about  her 
remains  were  found  portions  of  such  fine  gold  flat  thread,  once 
forming  the  burial  garment  with  which  she  had  been  arrayed  for 
her  funeral. 

When  pope  Paschal,  a.d.  821,  sought  for  the  body  of  St.  Cecily 
who  was  martyred  in  the  year  230,  the  pontiff  found  the  body  in 
the  catacombs,  whole  and  dressed  in  a  garment  wrought  all  of 
gold,  with  some  of  her  raiment  drenched  in  blood  lying  at  her  feet. 
In  making  the  foundations  for  the  new  St.  Peter's  at  Rome  the 
workmen  came  upon  and  looked  into  the  marble  sarcophagus  in 
which  had  been  buried  Probus  Anicius,  prefect  of  the  Pretorian, 
and  his  wife  Proba  Faltonia,  each  of  whose  bodies  was  wrapped 
in  a  winding-sheet  woven  of  pure  gold  strips.  The  wife  of  the 
emperor  Honorius  died  sometime  about  the  year  400,  and  when 
her  grave  was  opened,  in  1544,  the  golden  tissues  in  which  her 
body  had  been  shrouded  were  taken  out  and  melted,  amounting 
in  weight  to  thirty-six  pounds.  The  late  father  Marchi  also  found 
among  the  remains  of  St.  Hyacinthus  several  fragments  of  the 
same  kind  of  golden  web. 

Childeric,  the  second  king  of  the  Merovingean  dynasty,  was 
buried  a.d.  482,  at  Tournai.    In  the  year  1653  his  grave  was 


TEXTILES.  V  b 

Cv 

discovered,  and  amid  the  earth  about  it  so  many  remains  bfgure 
gold  strips  were  turned  up  that  there  is  every  ground  for  thirling 
that  the  Frankish  king  was  wrapped  in  a  mantle  of  golden  stuff 
for  his  burial.  We  have  reason  to  conclude  that  the  strips  of 
pure  gold  out  of  which  the  burial  cloak  of  Childeric  was  woven 
were  not  round  but  flat,  from  the  fact  that  in  a  Merovingean 
burial  ground  at  Envermeu  the  distinguished  archaeologist  Cochet 
a  few  years  ago  came  upon  the  grave  once  filled  by  a  lady  whose 
head  had  been  wreathed  with  a  fillet  of  pure  golden  web,  the 
tissue  of  which  is  thus  described  :  "  Ces  fils  aussi  brillants  et  aussi 
frais  que  s'ils  sortaient  de  la  main  de  l'ouvrier,  n'etaient  ni  etires 
ni  cordes.  lis  etaient  plats  et  se  composaient  tout  simplement 
de  petites  lanieres  d'or  d'un  millimetre  de  largeur,  coupee  a  meme 
une  feuille  d'or  epaisse  de  moins  d'un  dixieme  de  millimetre.  La 
longeur  totale  de  quelques-uns  atteignait  parfois  jusqu'a  quinze 
ou  dix-huit  centimetres." 

Our  own  country  can  furnish  an  example  of  this  kind  of  golden 
textile.  On  Chessel  down,  in  the  isle  of  Wight,  when  Mr.  Hillier 
was  making  some  researches  in  an  old  Anglo-saxon  place  of 
burial,  the  diggers  found  pieces  of  gold  strips,  thin  and  quite  flat, 
which  are  figured  in  M.  Tabbe  Cochet's  learned  book  just  men- 
tioned. Of  the  same  rich  texture  must  have  been  the  vestment 
given  to  St.  Peter's  at  Rome  in  the  middle  of  the  ninth  century, 
and  described  in  the  Liber  Pontincalis  as  made  of  the  purest 
gold,  and  covered  with  precious  stones  :  "  Carolus  rex  sancto 
Apostolo  obtulit  ex  purissimo  auro  et  gemmis  constructam 
vestem,  etc." 

Such  a  weaving  of  pure  gold  was,  here  in  England,  followed 
certainly  as  late  as  the  beginning  of  the  tenth  century ;  very  likely 
much  later.  In  the  chapter  library  belonging  to  Durham  cathe- 
dral may  be  seen  a  stole  and  maniple,  which  bear  these  inscrip- 
tions :  "  iElniaed  fieri  precepit.  Pio  episcopo  Fridestano." 
Fridestan  was  consecrated  bishop  of  Winchester  a.  d.  905.  With 
these  webs  under  his  eye,  Mr.  Raine  writes  thus  :  "  In  the  first, 


iS 


TEXTILES. 


the  ground  work  of  the  whole  is  woven  exclusively  with  thread  of 
gold.  I  do  not  mean  by  thread  of  gold,  the  silver-gilt  wire  fre- 
quently used  in  such  matters,  but  real  gold  thread,  if  I  may  so 
term  it,  not  round,  but  flat.  This  is  the  character  of  the  whole 
web,  with  the  exception  of  the  figures,  the  undulating  cloud- 
shaped  pedestal  upon  which  they  stand,  the  inscriptions  and  the 
foliage  ;  for  all  of  which,  however  surprising  it  may  appear,  vacant 
spaces  have  been  left  by  the  loom,  and  they  themselves  afterwards 
inserted  with  the  needle."  Further  on,  in  his  description  of  a 
girdle,  the  same  writer  tells  us  :  "  Its  breadth  is  exactly  seven- 
eighths  of  an  inch.  It  has  evidently  proceeded  from  the  loom ; 
and  its  two  component  parts  are  a  flattish  thread  of  pure  gold, 
and  a  thread  of  scarlet  silk."  Another  very  remarkable  piece,  a 
fragment  (probably)  of  a  stole,  was  also  found  lately  at  Durham  in 
the  grave  of  bishop  Pudsey,  who  was  buried  about  the  middle  of 
the  twelfth  century.  This  was  exhibited  at  the  Society  of  anti- 
quaries, in  the  present  year,  1875.  It  is  made  of  rich  silk,  with  a 
diaper  pattern  in  gold  thread. 

This  love  for  such  glittering  attire,  not  only  for  sacred  use  but 
secular  wear,  lasted  long  in  England.  The  golden  webs  went 
under  different  names ;  at  first  they  were  called  "  ciclatoun,"  "  sig- 
laton,"  or  "  siklatoun,"  as  the  writer's  fancy  led  him  to  spell  the 
Persian  word  common  for  them  at  the  time  throughout  the  east. 

By  the  old  English  ritual  plain  cloth  of  gold  was  allowed,  as 
now,  to  be  used  for  white  when  that  colour  happened  to  be 
ordered  by  the  rubric.  Thus  in  the  reign  of  Richard  the  second, 
among  the  vestments  at  the  chapel  of  St.  George,  Windsor  castle,, 
there  was  "  one  good  vestment  of  cloth  of  gold  and  St.  Paul's, 
London,  had  at  the  end  of  the  thirteenth  century  two  amices 
embroidered  with  pure  gold. 

This  splendid  -web  was  often  wrought  so  thick  and  strong 
that  each  string,  whether  it  happened  to  be  of  hemp  or  of  silk  had 
in  the  warp  six  threads,  while  the  weft  was  of  flat  gold  shreds. 
Hence  such  a  texture  was  called  "  samit,"  a  word  shortened  from 


TEXTILES. 


T9 


its  first  and  old  Byzantine  name  "  exsamit."  The  quantity  of  this 
costly  cloth  kept  in  the  wardrobe  of  Edward  the  first  was  so  great, 
that  the  nobles  of  that  king  were  allowed  to  buy  it  out  of  the 
royal  stores  ;  for  instance,  four  pieces  at  thirty  shillings  each  were 
sold  to  Robert  de  Clifford,  and  another  piece  at  the  same  price 
to  Thomas  de  Cammill.  Not  only  Asia  minor  but  the  island  of 
Cyprus,  the  city  of  Lucca,  and  Moorish  Spain,  sent  us  these  rich 
tissues.  With  other  things  left  at  Haverford  castle  by  Richard 
the  second  were  twenty-five  cloths  of  gold  of  divers  suits,  of 
which  four  came  from  Cyprus,  the  others  from  Lucca:  "xxv. 
draps  d'or  de  diverses  suytes  dount  iiii.  de  Cipres  les  autres  de 
Lukes."  How  Edward  the  fourth  liked  cloth  of  gold  for  his  per- 
sonal wear  may  be  gathered  from  his  wardrobe  accounts,  edited 
by  Nicolas ;  and  the  lavish  use  of  this  stuff  ordered  by  Richard 
the  third  for  his  coronation  is  recorded  in  the  Antiquarian  Re- 
pertory. 

A  "  gowne  of  cloth-of-gold,  furred  with  pawmpilyon,  ayenst 
Corpus  Xpi  day"  was  bought  for  Elizabeth  of  York,  afterwards 
queen  of  Henry  the  seventh,  for  her  to  wear  as  she  walked  in  the 
procession  on  that  great  festival.  The  affection  shown  by  Henry 
the  eighth  and  all  our  nobility,  men  and  women,  of  the  time,  for 
cloth  of  gold  in  their  garments  was  unmis takingly  set  forth  in 
many  of  the  paintings  brought  together  in  the  very  instructive 
exhibition  of  national  portraits  in  1866,  in  the  South  Kensington 
museum.  The  price  of  this  stuff  seems  to  have  been  costly ;  for 
princess  (afterwards  queen)  Mary,  thirteen  years  before  she  came 
to  the  throne,  "payed  to  Peycocke,  of  London,  for  xix  yerds 
iii.  qft  of  clothe  of  golde  at  xxxviij.s  the  yerde,  xxxvij//.  xs.  v]d." 
And  for  "  a  yerde  and  dr  qrt  of  clothe  of  siluer  xh" 

As  between  common  silk  and  satin  there  runs  a  broad  differ- 
ence in  appearance,  one  being  dull,  the  other  smooth  and  glossy, 
so  there  is  a  great  distinction  to  be  made  among  cloths  of  gold ; 
some  are,  so  to  say,  dead ;  others,  brilliant  and  sparkling.  When 
the  gold  is  twisted  into  its  silken  filament  it  takes  the  deadened 

c  2 


-o  TEXTILES. 

■ 

look  •  when  the  flattened,  filmy  strip  of  metal  is  rolled  about  it  so 
evenly  as  to  bring  its  edges  close  to  one  another,  it  seems  to  be 
one  unbroken  wire  of  gold,  sparkling  and  lustrous.  This  kind 
.  during  the  middle  ages  went  by  the  term  of  Cyprus  gold ;  and  rich 
samits  woven  with  it  were  called  damasks  of  Cyprus. 

As  time  went  on  cloths  of  gold  had  other  names.  What  the 
thirteenth  century  called,  first,  "ciclatoun,"  then  "baudekin," 
afterward  "  nak,"  was  called,  two  hundred  years  later,  "tissue": 
a  bright  shimmering  golden  textile.  The  very  thin  smooth  paper 
which  still  goes  by  the  name  of  tissue-paper  was  originally  made 
to  be  put  between  the  folds  of  this  rich  stuff  to  prevent  fraying  or 
tarnish,  when  laid  by. 

The  gorgeous  and  entire  set  of  vestments  presented  to  the 
altar  at  St.  Alban's  abbey,  by  Margaret,  duchess  of  Clarence, 
a.  d.  1429,  and  made  of  the  cloth  of  gold  commonly  called 
"  tyssewys,"  must  have  been  as  remarkable  for  the  abundance  and 
purity  of  the  gold  in  its  texture,  as  for  the  splendour  of  the 
precious  stones  set  on  it  and  the  exquisite  beauty  of  its  em- 
broideries. The  large  number  of  vestments  made  out  of  gold 
tissue,  and  of  crimson,  light  blue,  purple,  green,  and  black,  once 
belonging  to  York  cathedral,  are  all  duly  registered  in  the  valuable 
"  Fabric  rolls n  of  that  church  lately  published  by  the  Surtees 
society. 

Among  the  many  rich  and  costly  vestments  in  Lincoln  cathe- 
dral, some  were  made  of  this  sparkling  golden  tissue  contra- 
distinguished in  its  inventory  from  the  duller  cloth  of  gold,  thus  : 
"  Four  good  copes  of  blew  tishew  with  orphreys  of  red  cloth  of 
gold,  wrought  with  branches  and  leaves  of  velvet  f  "  a  chesable 
with  two  tunacles  of  blew  tishew  having  a  precious  orphrey  of 
cloth  of  gold/' 

Silken  textures  ornamented  with  designs  in  copper  gilt  thread 
were  manufactured  and  honestly  sold  for  what  they  really  were : 
of  such  inferior  quality  we  find  mention  in  the  inventory  of  vest- 
ments at  Winchester  cathedral,  drawn  up  by  order  of  Henry  the 


TEXTILES, 

eighth,  where  we  read  of  "  twenty-eight  copys  of  whirl 
woven  with  copper  gold."  Another  imitation  of  woof  < 
possibly  fraudulent.  This,  originally  perhaps  Saracenic, 
tised  by  the  Spaniards  of  the  south,  and  was  not  easily  discovert 
Hie  very  finest  skins  were  sought  out  for  the  purpose,  as  thin  as 
that  now  rare  kind  of  vellum  called  "  uterine"  by  collectors  of 
manuscripts.  These  were  heavily  gilt  and  then  cut  into  very 
narrow  strips,  to  be  used  instead  of  the  true  golden  thread. 

The  gilding  of  fine  silk  and  canvas  in  imitation  of  cloth  of 
gold,  like  our  gilding  of  wood  and  other  substances,  was  also 
sometimes  resorted  to  for  splendour's  sake  on  temporary  occa- 
sions ;  such,  for  instance,  as  some  stately  procession  or  a  solemn 
burial  service.  Mr.  Raine  tells  us  he  found  in  a  grave  at  Durham, 
among  other  textiles,  "  a  robe  of  thinnish  silk ;  the  ground  colour 
of  the  whole  is  amber ;  and  the  ornamental  parts  were  literally 
covered  with  leaf  gold,  of  which  there  remained  distinct  and  very 
numerous  portions."  In  the  churchyard  of  Cheam,  Surrey,  in 
1865,  the  skeleton  of  a  priest  was  found  who  had  been  buried 
some  time  during  the  fourteenth  century ;  around  the  waist  was  a 
flat  girdle  made  of  brown  silk  that  had  been  gilt.  In  the  '  Ro- 
maunt  of  the  rose'  translated  by  Chaucer,  dame  Gladnesse  is 
thus  described : — 

— in  an  over  gilt  samire 
Clad  she  was ; 

and  on  a  piece  of  German  orphrey-web,  in  the  South  Kensington 
collection,  no.  1373,  and  probably  made  at  Cologne  in  the  six- 
teenth century,  the  gold  is  laid  by  the  gilding  process. 

Silver  also,  as  well  as  gold,  was  hammered  out  into  very  thin 
sheets  which  were  cut  into  narrow  long  shreds  to  be  woven, 
unmixed  with  anything  else,  into  a  web  for  garments.  Of  this 
we  have  a  striking  illustration  in  the  Acts  of  the  apostles,  where 
St.  Luke,  speaking  of  Herod  Agrippa,  says  that  he  presented  him- 
self to  the  people  arrayed  in  kingly  apparel,  who,  to  flatter  him. 


TEXTILES. 


shouted  that  his  was  the  voice  not  of  a  man  but  of  a  god;  and 
forthwith  he  was  smitten  by  a  loathsome  disease  which  shortly 
killed  him.  This  royal  robe,  as  Josephus  informs  us,  was  a  tunic 
made  of  silver  and  wonderful  in  its  texture. 

Intimately  connected  with  the  raw  materials,  and  how  they 
were  wrought  in  the  loom,  is  the  question  about  the  time  when 
wire  drawing  was  found  out.  At  what  period  and  among  what 
people  the  art  of  working  up  pure  gold,  or  gilded  silver,  into 
a  long,  round,  hair-like  thread — into  what  may  be  correctly  called 
"wire" — began,  is  quite  unknown.  That  with  their  mechanical 
ingenuity  the  ancient  Egyptians  bethought  themselves  of  some 
method  for  the  purpose  is  not  unlikely.  From  Sir  Gardiner 
Wilkinson  we  learn  that  at  Thebes  were  found  objects  which  ap- 
peared to  be  made  of  gold  wire.  We  may  fairly  presume  that  the 
work  upon  the  corslets  of  king  Arnasis,  already  spoken  of  as  done 
by  the  needle  in  gold,  required  by  its  minuteness  that  the  metal 
should  be  not  flat  but  in  the  shape  of  wire.  By  delicate  manage- 
ment perhaps  of  the  ringers,  the  narrow  flat  strips  might  have 
been  pinched  or  doubled  up  so  that  the  two  edges  should  meet, 
and  then  rubbed  between  two  pieces  of  hard  material  a  golden 
wire  of  the  required  fineness  would  be  produced.  In  Etruscan  and ' 
Greek  jewellery  wire  is  often  to  be  found  ;  but  in  all  instances  it 
is  so  well  shaped  and  so  even  that  it  must  have  been  fashioned  by 
some  rolling  process.  The  filigree  work  of  the  middle  ages  is 
often  very  fine  and  delicate.  Probably  the  embroidery  which  we 
read  of  in  the  descriptions  of  the  vestments  belonging  to  our  old 
churches  (for  instance  "An  amice  embroidered  with  pure  gold") 
was  worked  with  gold  wire.  To  go  back  to  Anglo-saxon  times  in 
this  country,  such  gold  wire  would  seem  to  have  been  then  well 
known  and  employed,  since  in  Peterborough  minster  there  were 
two  golden  altar-cloths:  "  ii.  gegylde  ]?eofad  sceatas;"  and  there 
were  at  Ely  cathedral  "  two  girdles  of  gold  wire"  in  the  reign  of 
William  Rufus. 

The  first  use  of  a  wire-drawing  machine  seems  to  have  been 


TEXTILES.  23 

about  the  year  1360,  at  Nuremberg  ;  and  it  was  not  until  tw:3km- 
dred  years  after,  in  1560,  that  the  method  was  brought  to  EngMtfJ.^ 
Two  examples  of  a  stuff  with  pure  wire  in  it  may  be  seen  in  the" 
South  Kensington  collection,  nos.  8581  and  8228. 

The  process  of  twining  long  narrow  strips  of  gold,  or  gilt 
silver,  round  a  line  of  silk  or  flax  and  thus  producing  gold  thread 
is  much  earlier  than  has  been  supposed ;  and  when  Attalus's  name 
was  bestowed  upon  a  new  method  of  interweaving  gold  with  wool 
or  linen,  thence  called  "  Attalic,"  it  was  probably  because  he 
suggested  to  the  weaver  the  introduction  of  the  long-known 
golden  thread  as  a  woof  into  the  textiles  from  his  loom.  It  would 
seem,  from  a  passage  in  Claudian,  that  ladies  at  an  early  Christian 
period  used  to  spin  their  own  gold  thread.  Writing  at  the  end  of 
the  fourth  century,  the  poet  thus  compliments  Proba : 

The  joyful  mother  plies  her  learned  hands, 
And  works  all  o'er  the  trabea  golden  bands, 
Draws  the  thin  strips  to  all  their  length  of  gold, 
To  make  the  metal  meaner  threads  enfold. 

The  superior  quality  of  some  gold  thread  was  known  to  the 
mediaeval  world  under  the  name  of  the  place  where  it  had  been 
made.  Thus  we  find  mention  at  one  time  of  Cyprus  gold  thread; 
u  a  vestment  embroidered  with  eagles  of  gold  of  Cyprus  :  "  later, 
of  Venice  gold  thread,  "  for  frenge  of  gold  of  Venys  at  vj>.  the 
ounce and  again,  "  one  cope  of  unwatered  camlet  laid  with 
strokes  of  Venis  gold."  What  may  have  been  their  difference 
cannot  now  be  pointed  out:  .perhaps  the  Cyprian  thread  was 
esteemed  because  its  somewhat  broad  shred  of  flat  gold  was 
wound  about  the  hempen  twist  beneath  it  so  nicely  as  to  have 
the  smooth  unbroken  look  of  gold  wire  ;  while  the  manufacture  of 
Venice  showed  everywhere  the  twisting  of  common  thread. 


CHAPTER  IV. 


In  earlier  times,  as  at  present,  silks  had  various  names,  dis- 
tinguishing either  their  kind  of  texture,  their  colour,  the  design 
woven  on  them,  the  country  from  which  they  were  brought,  or  the 
use  for  which,  on  particular  occasions,  they  happened  to  be 
especially  set  apart. 

All  these  designations  are  of  foreign  growth;  some  sprang  up 
in  the  seventh  and  following  centuries  at  Byzantium ;  some  are 
half  Greek,  half  Latin,  jumbled  together;  others,  borrowed  from 
the  east,  are  so  shortened,  so  badly  and  variously  spelt,  that  their 
Arabic  or  Persian  derivation  can  be  hardly  recognized  at  present. 
Yet  without  some  slight  knowledge  of  them  we  hardly  under- 
stand a  great  deal  belonging  to  trade,  and  the  manners  of  the 
times  glanced  at  by  old  writers ;  much  less  can  we  see  the  true 
meaning  of  many  passages  in  our  mediaeval  English  poetry. 

Among  the  terms  significative  of  the  kind  of  web,  or  mode 
of  getting  up  some  sorts  of  silk,  we  have  Ifolosericum,  the  texture 
of  which  is  warp  and  woof  wholly  pure  silk.  From  a  passage  in 
Lampridius  we  learn  that  so  early  as  the  reign  of  Alexander 
Severus  the  difference  between  "  vestes  holosericae  "  and  "  sub- 
sericae"  was  strongly  marked,  and  that  sulsericum  implied  that 
the  texture  was  not  entirely  but  in  part,  probably  the  woof, 
of  silk. 

Examitunty  xamitum,  or,  as  it  is  called  in  old  English  docu- 
ments, samite  is  made  up  of  two  Greek  words,  e£,  "  six,"  and  /xtrot, 


TEXTILES. 


"  threads the  number  of  the  strings  in  the  warp  of  the  textual  y 


It  is  evident  that  stuffs  woven  so  thick  must  have  been  of  the  best 
quality.  Hence,  to  say  of  any  silken  tissue  that  it  was  "ex- 
amitum"  or  "samit"  meant  that  it  was  six-threaded,  and  there- 
fore costly  and  splendid.  At  the  end  of  the  thirteenth  and  be- 
ginning of  the  fourteenth  centuries  "examitum"  was  much  used 
for  vestments  in  Evesham  abbey,  as  we  gather  from  the  chronicle 
of  that  house,  published  lately  for  the  Master  of  the  Rolls. 
About  the  same  period  among  the  best  copes,  chasubles,  and 
vestments  in  St.  Paul's,  London,  many  were  made  of  samit.  So, 
again  among  the  nine  gorgeous  chasubles  bequeathed  to  Durham 
cathedral  by  its  bishop  in  1195,  the  chief  was  of  red  samit 
superbly  embroidered.  And,  to  name  no  more,  we  find  in  the 
valuable  inventory,  lately  published,  of  the  rich  vestments  belong- 
ing to  Exeter  cathedral  in  1277  that  the  best  of  its  numerous 
chasubles,  dalmatics,  and  copes,  were  made  of  samit.  In  a  later 
document,  a.  d.  1327,  this  precious  silk  is  termed  "samicta." 

The  poets  did  not  forget  to  array  their  knights  and  ladies  in 
this  gay  attire.  When  Sir  Lancelot  of  the  lake  brought  back 
Gawain  to  king  Arthur  : 


In  his  'Romaunt  of  the  rose/  Chaucer  describes  the  dress 
of  Mirth  thus  : 


Launcelot  and  the  queen  were  cledde 


In  robes  of  a  rich  wede, 
Of  samyte  white,  with  silver  shredde  : 


*  *  #  #  * 
The  other  knights  everichone, 


In  samyte  green  of  heathen  land, 
And  their  kirtles,  ride  alone. 


Full  yong  he  was,  and  merry  of  thought 
And  in  samette,  with  birdes  wrought, 
And  with  gold  beaten  full  fetously, 
His  bodie  was  clad  full  richely. 


Many  of  the  beautifully  figured  damasks  in  the  South  Kensing- 


2  6 


TEXTILES. 


ton  collection  are  what  anciently  were  known  as  "  samits  ; "  and 
if  they  really  be  not  six-thread,  according  to  the  etymology  of 
their  name,  it  is  because  at  a  very  early  period  the  stuffs  so  called 
ceased  to  be  woven  of  such  a  thickness. 

The  strong  silks  of  the  present  day  with  the  thick  thread  called 
"  organzine  "  for  the  woof,  and  a  slightly  thinner  thread  known  by 
the  technical  name  of  "  tram "  for  the  warp,  may  be  taken  to 
represent  the  old  "  examits." 

No  less  remarkable  for  the  lightness  of  its  texture  than  was 
the  samit  on  account  of  the  thick  substance  of  its  web,  and  quite 
as  much  sought  after,  was  another  kind  of  thin  glossy  silken  stuff 
"  wrought  in  the  orient,"  and  here  called  first  by  the  Persian  name 
which  came  with  it,  ciclatoun,  that  is,  bright  and  shining ;  but 
afterwards  sicklatoun,  stglaton,  cyclas.  Sometimes  a  woof  of  golden 
thread  lent  it  still  more  glitter ;  and  it  was  used  both  for  eccle- 
siastical vestments  and  for  secular  articles  of  stately  dress.  In  the 
inventory  of  St.  Paul's  cathedral,  1295,  there  was  a  cope  made  of 
cloth  of  gold,  called  ciclatoun  :  "  capa  de  panno  aureo  qui  vocatur 
ciclatoun."  Among  the  booty  carried  off  by  the  English  when 
they  sacked  the  camp  of  Saladin, 

King  Richard  took  the  pavillouns 
Of  sendal,  and  of  cyclatoun. 

In  his  6  Rime  of  Sire  Thopas/  Chaucer  says 

Of  Brugges  were  his  hosen  broun 
His  robe  was  of  ciclatoun. 

Though  so  light  and  thin,  this  cloak  of  "  ciclatoun  "  was  often 
embroidered  in  silk  and  had  golden  ornaments  sewn  on  it ;  we 
read  in  the  i  Metrical  romances  '  of  a  maiden  who  sat 

In  a  robe  ryght  ryall  bowne 

Of  a  red  syclatowne 
Be  hur  fader  syde ; 
A  coronell  on  hur  hedd  set, 
Hur  clothys  with  bestes  and  byrdes  wer  bete 

All  abowte  for  pryde. 


/ 

IE X  TILES.  V  27 

Knights  in  the  field  wore  over  their  armour  a  long  sleev^fess 
gown  slit  up  almost  to  the  waist  on  both  sides;  sometimes, (ff 

samit,"  often  of  "  cendal,"  oftener  still  of  "  ciclatourn  :  "  and  tnes, 
name  of  the  gown  itself,  shortened  from  the  material,  became 
known  as  "  cyclas."  Matthew  of  Westminster  records  that  when 
Edward  the  first  knighted  his  son  in  Westminster  abbey  he  sent 
to  three  hundred  sons  of  the  nobility,  whom  the  prince  was  after- 
ward to  dub  knights  in  the  same  church,  a  most  splendid  gift  of 
attire,  fitting  for  the  ceremony;  among  which  were  clycases 
woven  with  gold.  That  these  garments  were  very  light  and  thin 
we  gather  from  the  quiet  wit  of  John  of  Salisbury,  who  jeers  a  man 
affecting  to  perspire  in  the  depth  of  winter,  though  clad  in  nothing 
but  his  fine  cyclas. 

Not  so  costly  was  a  silken  stuff  known  as  cendal,  cendalhis, 
sandal,  sandalin,  cendatus,  syndon,  syndonus,  as  the  way  of  writing 
the  word  altered  as  time  went  on.  When  Sir  Guy  of  Warwick 
was  knighted, 

And  with  him  twenty  good  gomes 
Knightes'  and  barons'  sons, 
Of  cloth  of  Tars  and  rich  cendale 
Was  the  dobbing  in  each  deal. 

The  Roll  of  Caerlaverock  tells  us  that  among  the  grand  array 
which  joined  Edward  the  first  at  Carlisle  in  1300,  there  was  to  be 
seen  many  a  rich  caparison  embroidered  upon  cendal  and  samit : 

La  ot  meint  riche  guarnement 
Brode  sur  sendaus  e  samis  : 

and  Lacy,  earl  of  Lincoln,  leading  the  first  squadron,  hoisted  his 
banner  made  of  yellow  cendal  blazoned  with  a  lion  rampant  purpre 

Baner  out  de  un  cendal  safrin, 
O  un  lioun  rampant  purprin. 

When  Sir  Bevis  of  Southampton  wished  to  keep  himself 
unknown  at  a  tournament,  we  thus  read  of  him : 


28  TEXTILES. 

Sir  Bevis  disguised  all  his  weed 

Of  black  cendal  and  of  rede, 

Flourished  with  roses  of  silver  bright,  etc. 

Of  the  ten  silken  albs  which  Hugh  Pudsey  left  to  Durham, 
two  were  made  of  samit  and  two  of  cendal,  or  as  the  bishop  calls 
it,  sandal.  Exeter  cathedral  had  a  red  cope  with  a  green  lining 
of  sandal  and  a  cape  of  sandaline  :  "  Una  capa  de  sandalin." 
Piers  Ploughman  speaks  thus  to  the  women  of  his  day  : 

And  ye  lovely  ladies 
With  youre  long  fyngres, 
That  ye  have  silk  and  sandal 
To  sowe,  whan  tyme  is. 
Chesibles  for  chapeleyns, 
Chirches  to  honoure,  etc. 

A  stronger  kind  of  cendal  was  wrought  and  called,  in  the  Latin 
inventories  of  the  thirteenth  and  fourteenth  centuries,  "  cendatus 
afforciatus  :  "  there  was  a  cope  of  this  material  at  St.  Paul's,  and 
another  cope  of  cloth  of  gold  was  lined  with  it. 

Syndonus  or  Sindonis,  as  it  would  seem,  was  a  bettermost  sort 
of  cendal.  St.  Paul's  had  a  chasuble  as  well  as  a  cope  of  this 
fabric. 

Taffeta,  if  not  a  thinner,  was  a  less  costly  silken  stuff  than 
cendal ;  which  word,  to  this  day,  is  used  in  the  Spanish  language, 
and  is  denned  to  be  a  thin  transparent  textile  of  silk  or  linen  : 
"  Tela  de  seda  6  lino  muy  delgada  y  trasparente."  Taffeta  and 
cendal  were  used  for  linings  in  mediaeval  England.  Chaucer  says 
of  his  "  doctour  of  phisike," 

In  sanguin  and  in  perse  he  clad  was  alle 
Lined  with  taffeta  and  with  sendalle. 

Sarcc7iet  during  the  fifteenth  century  took  by  degrees  the  place 
of  cendal,  at  least  here  in  England. 

By  some  improvement  in  their  weaving  of  cendal,  the  Saracens 
in  the  south  of  Spain  earned  for  this  light  web  a  good  name  in 


TEXTILES.  |   ,  29 

our  markets,  and  it  became  much  sought  for  here.  Among\pther 
places,  York  cathedral  had  several  sets  of  curtains  for  its  Kjgji 
altar,  "  de  sarcynet."  At  first  this  stuff  was  called  from  its  makersf 
"  saracenicum."  But,  in  Anglicising,  the  name  was  shortened 
into  "  sarcenet ; "  a  word  which  we  use  now  for  the  thin  silk 
which  of  old  was  known  among  us  as  "cendal." 

Satin,  though  far  from  being  so  common  as  other  silken 
textures,  was  not  unknown  to  England  in  the  middle  ages ;  and 
Chaucer  speaks  of  it  in  his  6  Man  of  lawes  tale  : ' 

In  Surrie  whilom  dwelt  a  compagnie 
Oi  chapmen  rich,  and  therto  sad  and  trewe, 
That  wide  were  senten  hir  spicerie, 
Clothes  of  gold,  and  satins  rich  of  hewe. 

When  satin  first  appeared  in  trade  it  was  called  round  the 
shores  of  the  Mediterranean  "aceytuni."  The  term  slipped 
through  early  Italian  lips  into  "  zetani ; "  coming  westward  this 
name,  in  its  turn,  dropped  its  "i,"  and  smoothed  itself  into  "satin." 
So,  also,  it  is  called  in  France ;  while  in  Italy  it  now  goes  by  the 
name  of  "  raso,"  and  the  Spaniards  keep  up  its  first  designation. 

In  the  earlier  inventories  of  church  vestments  no  mention  can 
be  found  of  satin ;  but  this  fine  silk  is  spoken  of  among  the  various 
rich  bequests  made  to  his  cathedral  at  Exeter  by  bishop  Grandison, 
about  1340 ;  though  later,  and  especially  in  the  royal  wardrobe 
accompts,  it  is  very  commonly  specified.  Hence  we  may  fairly 
assume  that  till  the  fourteenth  century  satin  was  unknown  in 
England  ;  afterwards  it  met  with  much  favour.  Flags  were  made 
of  it.  On  board  the  stately  ship  in  which  Beauchamp  earl  of 
Warwick,  in  the  reign  of  Henry  the  sixth,  sailed  from  England  to 
France,  there  were  flying  "  three  penons  of  satten,"  besides  "  six- 
teen standards  of  worsted  entailed  with  a  bear  and  a  chain/'  and 
a  great  streamer  of  forty  yards  in  length  and  eight  yards  in  breadth, 
with  a  great  bear  and  griffin  holding  a  ragged  staff  poudred  full  of 
ragged  staffs.  Like  other  silken  textiles,  satin  seems  to  have 
been  in  some  instances  interwoven  with  flat  gold  thread :  for 


3o  TEXTILES. 

example,  Lincoln  had  of  the  gift  of  one  of  its  bishops  eighteen 
copes  of  red  tinsel  sattin  with  orphreys  of  gold. 

Though  not  often,  yet  sometimes  we  read  of  a  silken  stuft 
called  cadas,  carda,  cardials,  and  used  for  inferior  purposes.  The 
outside  silk  on  the  cocoon  is  of  a  poor  quality  compared  with  the 
inner  filaments,  from  which  it  is  kept  apart  in  reeling,  and  set 
aside  for  other  uses.  We  find  mention  of  such  cloths  as  belonging 
to  the  cathedrals  of  Exeter  and  St.  Paul's  in  the  thirteenth  cen- 
tury. More  frequently,  instead  of  being  spun,  it  served  as  wadding 
in  dress :  on  the  barons  at  the  siege  of  Caerlaverock  might  be 
seen  many  a  rich  gambeson  garnished  with  silk,  cadas,  and 
cotton : 

Meint  riche  gamboison  guarni 
De  soi,  de  cadas  e  coton. 

The  quantity  of  card  purchased  for  the  royal  wardrobe,  in  the 
year  1299,  is  set  forth  in  the  Liber  quotidianus. 

Camoca,  camoka,  camak,  as  the  name  is  differently  written,  was 
a  textile  of  which  in  England  we  hear  nothing  before  the  latter 
end  of  the  fourteenth  century.  No  sooner  did  it  make  its  appear- 
ance than  this  camoca  rose  into  great  repute ;  the  Church  used  it 
for  her  vestments,  and  royalty  employed  it  for  dress  as  well  as  in 
adorning  palaces,  especially  in  draping  beds  of  state.  In  the  year 
1385,  besides  some  smaller  articles,  the  royal  chapel  in  Windsor 
castle  had  a  whole  set  of  vestments  and  other  ornaments  for  the 
altar,  of  white  camoca ;  and  our  princes  must  have  arrayed  them- 
selves, on  grand  occasions,  in  the  same  material ;  for  Herod,  in 
one  of  the  Coventry  mysteries — the  adoration  of  the  Magi — is 
made  to  boast  of  himself:  "In  kyrtyl  of  cammaka  kynge  am  I 
cladde."  But  it  was  in  draping  its  state-beds  that  our  ancient 
royalty  showed  its  affection  for  camoca.  Edward  the  Black 
Prince  bequeaths  to  his  confessor  "a  large  bed  of  red  camoca 
with  our  arms  embroidered  at  each  corner,"  and  the  prince's 
mother  leaves  to  another  of  her  sons  "  a  bed  of  red  camak." 
Edward  lord  Despencer,  in  1375,  wills  to  his  wife  "my  great 


TEXTILES. 


3i 


bed  of  blue  camaka,  with  griffins,  also  another  bed  of  camaka, 
striped  with  white  and  black. "  What  may  have  been  the  real 
texture  of  this  stuff,  thought  so  magnificent,  we  do  not  positively 
know,  but  it  was  probably  woven  of  fine  camels'  hair  and  silk, 
and  of  Asiatic  workmanship. 

From  this  mixed  web  we  pass  to  another  more  precious,  the 
Cloth  of  Tars ;  which  we  presume  to  have  been  the  forerunner  of 
the  now  celebrated  cashmere,  and  together  with  silk  made  of  the 
downy  wool  of  goats  reared  in  several  parts  of  Asia,  but  especially 
in  Tibet. 

Velvet  is  a  silken  textile,  the  history  of  which  has  still  to  be 
written.  Of  the  country  whence  it  first  came,  or  the  people  who 
were  the  earliest  to  hit  upon  the  happy  way  of  weaving  it,  we 
know  nothing.  A  very  old  piece  was  in  the  beautiful  crimson 
cope  embroidered  by  English  hands  in  the  fourteenth  century, 
now  kept  at  the  college  of  Mount  St.  Mary,  Chesterfield. 

We  are  probably  indebted  to  central  Asia,  or  perhaps  China, 
for  velvet  as  well  as  satin ;  and  among  the  earliest  places  in 
Europe  where  it  was  manufactured,  were  perhaps  first  the  south  of 
Spain,  and  then  Lucca. 

In  the  earliest  of  the  inventories  which  we  have  of  church 
vestments,  that  of  Exeter  cathedral,  1277,  velvet  is  not  spoken  of; 
but  in  St.  Paul's,  London,  a.d.  1295,  there  is  some  notice  of 
velvet  with  its  kindred  web  "fustian,"  for  chasubles.  Velvet  is 
for  the  first  time  mentioned  at  Exeter  in  1327,  but  as  in  two 
pieces  not  made  up,  of  which  some  yards  had  been  then  sold  for 
vestment-making.  From  the  middle  of  the  fourteenth  century 
velvet  is  of  common  occurrence. 

The  name  itself  of  velvet,  "velluto,"  seems  to  point  out  Italy 
as  the  market  through  which  we  got  it  from  the  east,  for  the  word 
in  Italian  indicates  something  which  is  hairy  or  shaggy,  like  an 
animal's  skin. 

Fustian  was  known  at  the  end  of  the  thirteenth  century.  St. 
Paul's  cathedral  at  that  date  had  "a  white  chasuble  of  fustian.'' 


TEXTILES. 


In  an  English  sermon  preached  at  the  beginning  of  the  same 
century  great  blame  is  found  with  the  priest  who  had  his  chasuble 
made  of  middling  fustian  :  "  ]?e  meshakele  of  medeme  fustian." 
As  then  wove,  fustian  had  a  short  nap  on  it,  and  one  of  the 
domestic  uses  to  which  during  the  middle  ages  it  had  been  put 
was  for  bed  clothes,  as  thick  undersheets.  Lady  Bargavenny 
bequeaths,  in  1434,  "  A  bed  of  gold  of  swans,  two  pair  sheets  of 
raynes  (fine  linen,  made  at  Rheims),  a  pair  of  fustians,  six  pair  of 
other  sheets,  etc."  It  is  not  unlikely  that  this  stuff  may  have 
hinted  to  the  Italians  the  way  of  weaving  silk  in  the  same  manner, 
and  so  of  producing  velvet.  Other  nations  took  up  the  manufac- 
ture, and  the  weaving  of  velvet  was  wonderfully  improved.  It 
became  diapered  and,  upon  a  ground  of  silk  or  of  gold,  the 
pattern  came  out  in  a  bold  manner,  with  a  raised  pile.  At  last, 
the  most  beautiful  of  all  manners  of  diapering,  namely,  making 
the  pattern  to  show  itself  in  a  double  pile,  one  pile  higher  than 
the  other  and  of  the  same  tint,  now,  as  formerly,  known  as  velvet 
upon  velvet,  was  brought  to  its  highest  perfection  \  and  velvets  in 
this  fine  style  were  wrought  in  greatest  excellence  in  Italy,  in 
Spain  and  in  Flanders.  Our  old  inventories  often  specify  these 
differences  in  the  making  of  the  web.  York  cathedral  had  "  four 
copes  of  crimson  velvet  plaine,  with  orphreys  of  clothe  of  goulde, 
for  standers ;  "  "  agreene  cushion  of  raised  velvet ; "  and  "  a  cope 
of  purshed  velvet  (redd) :  "  "  purshed  99  means  that  the  velvet  was 
raised  in  a  network  pattern. 

Diaper  was  a  silken  fabric,  held  everywhere  in  high  estimation 
during  many  hundred  years,  both  abroad  and  in  England.  We 
know  this  from  documents  beginning  with  the  eleventh  century  : 
but  the  origin  of  the  name  is  uncertain.  Possibly,  in  order  to 
indicate  a  one-coloured  yet  patterned  silk,  which  diaper  is,  the 
Byzantine  Greeks  of  the  early  middle  ages  invented  the  term 
Stas-n-pov,  diaspron,  from  8tas7raa),  I  separate,  to  signify  "what 
distinguishes  or  separates  itself  from  things  about  it,"  as  every 
pattern  does  on  a  one -coloured  silk.    With  this  textile  the  Latins 


***    ' "i  \ 

TEXTILES.  V33  »\  ' 

took  the  name  for  it  from  the  Greeks  and  called  it  "  diaspe^,  c  ^ 
which  in  English  has  been  moulded  into  "  diaper."  In  the  year.  ^  *ft 
1066  the  empress  Agnes  gave  to  Monte  Cassino  a  diaper-chasuble 
of  cloth  of  gold,  "  planetam  diasperam."  This  early  mention  of 
the  name  seems  to  be  a  conclusive  argument  against  those  writers 
who  derive  it  from  Ypres,  in  Flanders ;  a  town  celebrated  for  linen 
manufactures  at  a  somewhat  later  period  :  yet  even  then,  accord- 
ing to  Chaucer,  rivalled  by  workwomen  in  England.  He  tells  us 
of  the  "good  wif  of  Bathe  "  that 

Of  cloth-making  she  hadde  swiche  an  haunt 
She  passed  hem  of  Ipres  and  of  Gaunt. 

In  the  South  Kensington  collection,  no.  1270  shows  how  these 
cloths  were  wrought  •  and  it  would  seem  that  cloth  of  gold  was 
often  diapered  with  a  pattern,  at  least  in  the  time  of  Chaucer,  who 
describes  it  on  the  housing  of  a  king's  horse  : 

 trapped  in  stele, 

Covered  with  cloth  of  gold  diapred  wele. 

Church  inventories  make  frequent  mention  of  such  diapered 
silks  for  vestments.  Exeter  cathedral  had  a  cope  of  white  diaper 
with  half  moons,  the  gift  of  bishop  Bartholomew,  in  1 1 6 1 .  Some- 
times the  pattern  of  the  diapering  is  noticed  ;  for  instance,  at  St. 
Paul's,  "  a  chasuble  of  white  diaper,  with  coupled  parrots  in  places, 
among  branches."  Probably  the  most  elaborate  specimen  of 
diaper-weaving  on  record  is  that  which  Edmund,  earl  of  Cornwall, 
gave  to  the  same  cathedral  •  "  a  cope  of  a  certain  diaper  of  Antioch 
•colour  covered  with  trees  and  diapered  birds,  of  which  the  heads, 
breasts  and  feet,  as  well  as  the  flowers  on  the  tress,  were  woven 
in  gold  thread." 

By  degrees  the  word  "  diaper  "  became  widened  in  its  mean- 
ing. Not  only  all  sorts  of  textile,  whether  of  silk,  of  linen,  or  of 
worsted,  but  the  walls  of  a  room  were  said  to  be  diapered  when 
the  self-same  ornament  was  repeated  and  sprinkled  well  over  it 

D 


34 


TEXTILES. 


Thus,  in  '  the  squire  of  low  degree/  the  king  of  Hungary  promises 
his  daughter  a  chair  or  carriage,  that 

Shal  be  coverd  wyth  velvette  reede 
And  clothes  of  fyne  golde  al  about  your  heede, 
With  damaske  whyte  and  azure  blewe 
Well  dyaperd  with  lylles  newe. 

The  bow  for  arrows  held  by  Sweet-looking  is,  in  Chaucer's 
'  Romaunt  of  the  rose/  described  as 

painted  well,  and  thwitten 
And  over  all  diapred  and  written,  etc. 

So  now,  we  call  our  fine  table  linen  "diaper"  because  it  is 
figured  with  flowers  and  fruits.  Sometimes  silks  diapered  were 
called  "fygury  :  "  as  the  cope  mentioned  in  the  York  fabric  rolls, 
"  una  capa  de  sateyn  fygury/' 


Ladies  spinning  and  weaving  ;  from  a  manuscript  of  the  fifteenth  century. 


CHAPTER  V. 


There  are  some  very  ancient  names,  distinguishing  different 
textiles,  which  require  notice  :  such  as  "  chrysoclavus,"  "  stau- 
raccin,"  "  polystaurium,"  "  gammadion"  or  "  gammadise,"  "  de 
quadruplo,"  "  de  octoplo,"  and  "  de  fundato."  Textiles  of  silk  and 
gold  are,  over  and  over  again,  enumerated  as  then  commonly 
known  under  such  names,  in  the  '  Liber  pontificalis  seu  de  gestis 
Romanorum  pontificum  : '  a  book  of  great  value  for  every  student 
of  early  Christian  art-work,  and  in  particular  of  textiles  and  em- 
broidery. 

The  Chrysoclavus,  or  golden  nail-head,  was  a  remnant  which 
lingered  a  long  time  among  the  ornaments  embroidered  on  eccle- 
siastical vestments  and  robes  for  royal  wear  of  that  once  so 
coveted  "latus  clavus,"  or  broad  nail-head-like  purple  round 
patch  worn  upon  the  outward  garment  of  the  old  Roman  digni- 
taries. In  the  court  of  Byzantium  this  mark  of  dignity  was 
elevated,  from  being  purple  on  white,  into  gold  upon  purple. 
Hence  it  came  that  all  rich  purple  silks,  woven  or  embroidered 
with  the  "  clavus"  in  gold,  were  known  from  their  pattern  as  gold 
nail-headed,  or  chrysoclavus ;  and  silken  textiles  of  Tyrian  dye, 
sprinkled  all  over  with  large  round  spots,  were  once  in  great 
demand.  Pope  Leo  in  795,  among  his  several  other  gifts  to  the 
churches  at  Rome,  bestowed  a  great  number  of  altar  frontals 
made  of  this  purple  and  gold  fabric,  as  we  are  told  by  Anastasius 

I)  2 


36 


TEXTILES. 


in  the  Liber  pontificalis.  Sometimes  these  "  clavi "  were  made  so 
large  that  upon  their  golden  ground  an  event  in  the  life  of  a  saint 
or  the  saint's  head  was  embroidered,  and  then  the  whole  piece 
was  called  "  sigillata,"  or  sealed. 

Stauracin  or  "  stauracinus,"  taking  its  name  from  oravpos 
the  Greek  for  "  cross,"  was  a  silken  stuff  figured  with  small  plain 
crosses,  and  therefore  from  their  number  sometimes  further  dis- 
tinguished by  the  word  signifying  that  meaning  in  Greek,  Poly- 
stauron. 

The  crosses  woven  on  the  various  fabrics  were  sometimes  of 
the  simplest  shape  ;  oftener  they  were  designed  after  an  elaborate 
type  with  a  symbolic  meaning  about  it  that  afforded  an  especial 
name  to  the  stuffs  upon  which  they  were  figured. 

This  name  Gammadion,  or  Gammadtce,  was  a  word  applied  as 
often  to  the  pattern  upon  silks  as  to  the  figures  wrought  upon 
gold  and  silver. 

In  the  Greek  alphabet  the  capital  letter  gamma  takes  the 
shape  of  an  exact  right  angle  thus,  T.  Being  so,  many  writers 
have  seen  in  it  an  emblem  of  our  Lord  as  our  corner-stone. 
Following  this  idea  artists  at  a  very  early  period  struck  out  a  way 
of  forming  the  cross  after  several  shapes  by  various  combinations 

_J  !_ 

with  it  of  this  letter  r.    Four  of  these  gammas  put  so  fall 

~~l  F 

into  the  shape  of  the  so-called  Greek  cross ;  and  in  this  form  it 
was  woven  upon  the  textiles  denominated  stauracinas;  or  pat- 
terned with  a  cross.  Being  one  of  the  four  same-shaped  elements 
of  the  cross's  figure,  the  part  was  significant  of  the  whole  :  and  as 
an  emblem  of  the  corner-stone,  our  Lord,  the  gamma  or  T,  was 
frequently  shown  at  one  edge  of  the  tunic  worn  by  the  apostles 
in  ancient  mosaics ;  wherein  sometimes  we  find,  in  place  of  the 
single  gamma,  the  figure  H  ;  another  combination  of  the  four 
gammas  in  the  cross.  Whatsoever,  therefore,  whether  of  metal 
or  of  silk,  was  found  to  be  marked  in  this  or  any  other  way  of 


TEXTILES 


37 


putting  the  gammas  together,  or  with  only  a  single  one,  was 
called  "  gammadion,"  or  "  gammadiae." 

Ancient  ingenuity  for  throwing  its  favourite  gamma  into  other 
combinations,  and  thus  bringing  out  pretty  and  graceful  patterns  to 
be  wrought  on  all  sorts  of  work  for  ecclesiastical  use,  did  not  stop 
here.  In  the  Liber  pontificalis  of  Anastasius  we  meet  not  unfre- 
quently  with  accounts  of  vestments,  etc.  "  de  stauracin  seu  quadra- 
polis";  or  "  de  quadrapolo";  or  "de  octapolo."  The  author  here 
evidently  means  to  imply  a  distinction  between  a  something  amount- 
ing to  four,  and  to  eight,  in  or  upon  these  textiles.  It  cannot  be  to 
say  that  one  fabric  was  woven  with  four,  the  other  with  eight 
threads  ;  had  that  been  so  meant,  the  fact  would  probably  then  have 
been  explained  by  a  word  constructed  like  "  examitus,"  p.  24.  As 
the  contrast  is  not  in  the  texture  it  must  be  in  the  pattern  of  the 
stuffs ;  that  is,  in  the  number  of  the  crosses  :  and  w.e  further 
see  why  "  stauracin  "  and  u  de  quadrapolis  "  are  interchangeable 
terms. 

At  the  end  of  Du  Cange's  glossary  is  an  engraving  of  a 
work  of  Greek  art ;  plate  IX.  Here  St.  John  Chrysostom  stands 
between  St.  Nicholas  and  St.  Basil.  All  three  are  arrayed  in  their 
liturgical  garments,  which  being  figured  with  crosses  are  of  the 
textile  called  of  old  "  stauracin but  there  is  a  marked  difference 
in  the  way  in  which  the  crosses  are  inserted.    The  crosses  are 

+  ©  +  © 

arranged  upon  the  vestment  of  St.  John  thus ; 

+  (+)  +  0 

St.  Nicholas  and  St.  Basil  have  chasubles  which  are  not  only  worked 
all  over  with  crosses  made  with  gammas,  but  are  surrounded  with 

r+-i  r+n 

.  .  j  •    .   ,  ,     LJLl  LJ_J 

other  gammas  joined  so  as  to  edge  in  the  crosses,  thus  ;  ^ 

L_tj 

As  four  gammas  only  are  necessary  to  form  all  the  crosses 


38  ;  TEXTILES. 

upon  St.  John's  vestment,  we  there  see  the  textile  called  "  stau- 
racin de  quadruplo,"  or  the  stuff  figured  with  a  cross  of  four 
(gammas)  ;  while  as  eight  of  these  letters  are  required  for  the 
pattern  on  the  others,  we  have  in  them  an  example  of  the  "  stau- 
racin  de  octapolo,"  or  "  octapulo,"  a  fabric  with  a  pattern  com- 
posed of  eight  gammas. 

A  far  more  ancient  and  universal  shape  fashioned  out  of  the 
repetition  of  the  same  letter  T,  is  that  known  as  Gammadion  ;  or, 
as  commonly  called  at  one  time  in  England,  the  Filfot.  Several 
pieces  in  the  South  Kensington  collection  exhibit  on  them  some 
modification  of  it:  for  example,  nos.  1261,  1325,  7052,  829A, 
8305,  8635,  and  8652.    Its  figure  is  made  out  of  the  usual  four 

gammas,  so  that  they  should  fall  together  thus  J — !  • 

Of  silks  patterned  with  the  plain  Greek  cross  or  "  stauracin" 
there  are  also  several  examples  in  the  same  collection  ;  and  though 
not  of  the  remotest  period  are  interesting.  No.  8234,  perhaps 
wrought  in  Sicily  by  the  Greeks  brought  as  prisoners  from  the  Morea 
in  the  twelfth  century,  is  not  without  some  value.  In  the  chapter 
library  at  Durham  may  be  seen  (as  we  learn  from  Mr.  Raine)  an 
example  of  Byzantine  stauracin  "  colours  purple  and  crimson ;  the 
only  prominent  ornament  a  cross — often  repeated,  even  upon  the 
small  portion  which  remains."  Those  who  have  seen  in  St. 
Peter's  sacristy  at  Rome  that  beautiful  light-blue  dalmatic  said  to 
have  been  worn  by  Charlemagne  when  he  sang  the  gospel,  vested 
as  a  deacon,  on  the  day  he  was  crowned  emperor,  will  remember 
how  plentifully  it  is  sprinkled  with  crosses  between  its  exquisite 
embroideries,  so  as  to  make  the  vestment  a  real  "  stauracin."  It 
has  been  well  given  by  Sulpiz  Boisseree  in  his  '  Kaiser  dalmatika 
in  der  St.  Peterskirche but  far  better  by  Dr.  Bock  in  his  splen- 
did work  on  the  coronation  robes  of  the  German  emperors. 

Silks  called  de  fundato,  from  the  pattern  woven  on  them,  are 
frequently  spoken  of  by  Anastasius.  From  the  text  of  that  writer, 
and  from  passages  in  other  authors  of  his  time,  it  would  seem 


y 

TEXTILES.  hr  3^ 

that  the  silks  themselves  were  dyed  of  the  richest  purple  v^and 
figured  with  gold  in  the  pattern  of  netting.  As  one  of  the  me&Jf— 
ings  for  the  word  "  funda"  is  a  fisherman's  net,  rich  textiles  scK 
figured  in  gold  were  denominated  "  de  fundato  "  or  netted.  We 
gather  also  from  Fortunatus  that  the  costly  purple-dyed  silks 
called  "blatta"  were  always  interwoven  with  gold.  This  net- 
pattern  lingered  long  and,  no  doubt,  we  find  it  under  a  new  name 
"  laqueatus" — meshed — upon  a  cope  belonging  to  the  church  of  St. 
Paul's,  London,  1295  :  where  an  inventory,  printed  by  Dugdale, 
includes  a  cope  of  baudekin  with  fir-cones  "  in  campis  laqueatis." 
Modifications  of  this  very  old  pattern  may  be  seen  at  South 
Kensington,  nos.  1264,  1266,  and  8234.  In  the  diapered  pattern 
on  some  of  the  cloth  of  gold  found  lately  in  the  grave  of  an  arch- 
bishop, buried  at  York  about  the  end  of  the  thirteenth  century, 
the  same  netting  is  discernible. 

Stragulatce,  striped  or  barred  silks,  were  at  one  time  in  much 
request.  Frequent  mention  is  made  of  them  in  the  Exeter  in- 
ventories ;  for  example,  in  1277,  there  were  two  palls  of  baudekin, 
one  "  stragulata."  The  illuminations  in  the  manuscript  in  the 
Harley  collection  at  the  British  museum  of  the  deposition  of 
Richard  the  second  affords  us  instances  of  this  textile.  The 
young  man  to  the  right  sitting  on  the  ground  at  the  archbishop's 
sermon  is  entirely,  hood  and  all,  arrayed  in  this  striped  silk ;  and 
at  the  altar,  where  Northumberland  is  swearing  on  the  eucharist, 
the  priest  who  is  saying  mass  wears  a  chasuble  of  the  same  stuff. 
Old  St.  Paul's  had  an  offertory-veil  of  the  same  pattern  ;  "  stragu- 
latum"  with  the  stripes  red  and  green. 

At  the  end  of  the  twelfth  century  there  was  brought  to  Eng- 
land, from  Greece,  a  sort  of  precious  silk  named  there  Imperial. 

Ralph,  dean  of  St  Paul's  cathedral,  tells  us  that  William  de 
Magna  Villa,  on  coming  home  from  his  pilgrimage  to  the  holy 
land  about  11 78,  made  presents  to  several  churches  of  cloths 
which  at  Constantinople  were  called  "  Imperial."  We  are  told  by 
Roger  Wendover,  and  after  him  by  Matthew  Paris,  that  the 


4o 


TEXTILES. 


apparition  of  king  John  was  dressed  in  royal  robes  made  of  the 
stuff  they  call  imperial.  In  the  inventory  of  St.  Paul's,  drawn  up 
in  1295,  four  tunicles  (vestments  for  subdeacons  and  lower 
ministers  at  the  altar)  are  mentioned  as  made  of  this  imperial. 
No  colour  is  specified,  except  in  the  one  instance  of  the  silk  being 
marbled  ;  and  the  patterns  are  noticed  as  of  red  and  green,  with 
lions  woven  in  gold.  It  seems  not  to  have  been  thought  good 
enough  for  the  more  important  vestments,  such  as  chasubles  and 
copes.  Probably  the  name  was  not  derived  from  its  colour  (sup- 
posed royal  purple)  nor  its  costliness,  but  for  quite  another 
reason  :  woven  at  a  workshop  kept  up  by  the  Byzantine  emperors, 
like  the,  Gobelins  is  to-day  in  Paris,  and  bearing  about  it  some 
small  though  noticeable  mark,  it  took  the  designation  of  "  Im- 
perial." We  know  it  was  partly  wrought  with  gold ;  but  that  its 
tint  was  always  some  shade  of  the  imperial  purple  is  a  gratuitous 
assumption.  • .  In  France  this  textile  was  in  use  as  late  as  the 
second  half  of  the  fifteenth  century,  but  looked  upon  as  old.  At 
York  somewhat  later,  in  the  early  part  of  the  sixteenth,  one  of  its 
deans  bestowed  on  that  cathedral  "two  (blue)  copes  of  clothe 
imperialle." 

Baudekin  was  a  costly  stuff  much  employed  and  often  spoken 
of  in  our  literature  during  many  years  of  the  mediaeval  period. 

Ciclatoun,  as  we  have  already  remarked,  was  the  usual  term 
during  centuries  throughout  western  Europe  by  which  the  showy 
golden  textiles  were  called.  When,  however,  Bagdad  or  Baldak 
held  for  no  short  length  of  time  the  lead  all  over  Asia  in  weaving 
fine  silks,  and  in  especial  golden  stuffs  shot  as  now  in  different 
colours,  tinted  cloths  of  gold  became  known,  and  more  particu- 
larly among  the  English,  as  "  baldakin,"  "  baudekin,"  or  "  baud- 
kyn,"  or  silks  from  Baldak.  At  last  the  earlier  term  "  ciclatoun  ,? 
dropped  out  of  use.  Remembering  this  the  reader  will  more 
readily  understand  several  otherwise  puzzling  passages  in  our  old 
writers,  as  well  as  in  the  inventories  of  royal  furniture  and  church 
vestments. 


TEXTILES. 


41 


Kings  and  the  nobility  affected  much  this  rich  stuff  for  the 
garments  worn  on  high  occasions.  When  Henry  the  third 
knighted  William' of  Valence,  in  1247,  he  had  on  a  robe  of  cloth 
of  gold  made  of  baudekin ;  "facta  de  pretiosissimo  baldekino." 
In  the  year  1259  the  master  of  Sherborn  hospital  in  the  north 
bequeathed  to  that  house  a  cope  made  of  the  like  stuff  s  "  de 
panno  ad  aurum  scilicet  baudekin."  Vestments  of  this  material 
are  frequently  mentioned  in  the  old  church  inventories. 

These  Bagdad  or  Baldak  silks,  with  a  weft  of  gold,  known 
among  us  as  "  baudekins"  were  often  woven  very  large  in  size,  and 
applied  here  in  England  to  especial  ritual  purposes.  As  a  thanks- 
offering  after  a  safe  return  home  from  a  journey  they  were 
brought  and  given  to  the  altar ;  at  the  solemn  burial  of  our  kings 
and  queens  and  other  great  people,  the  mourners,  when  offertory 
time  came,  went  to  the  hearse  and  threw  a  baudekin  of  costly 
texture  over  the  coffin.  We  may  learn  the  ceremonial  from  the 
descriptions  of  many  of  our  mediaeval  funerals.  At  the  obsequies 
of  Henry  the  seventh  in  Westminster  abbey :— "  Twoe  herauds 
came  to  the  duke  of  Buck,  and  to  the  earles,  and  conveyed  them 
into  the  revestrie  where  they  did  receive  certen  palles  which 
everie  of  them  did  bringe  solemly  betwene  theire  hands  and  com- 
minge  in  order  one  before  another  as  they  were  in  degree  unto 
the  said  herse,  thay  kissed  theire  said  palles  and  delivered  them 
unto  the  said  heraudes  which  laide  them  uppon  the  kyngs  corps, 
in  this  manner  :  the  palle  which  was  first  offered  by  the  duke 
of  Buck,  was  laid  on  length  on  the  said  corps,  and  the  residewe 
were  laid  acrosse,  as  thick  as  they  might  lie."  In  the  same 
church  at  the  burial  of  Anne  of  Cleves  in  1557,  a  like 
ceremonial  of  carrying  cloth-of-gold  palls  to  the  hearse  was 
followed.  So  also  the  religious  guilds,  or  other  companies,  in  the 
middle  ages  kept  palls  to  be  thrown  over  the  bodies  of  all  brothers 
or  sisters  at  their  burial,  however  lowly  may  have  been  their  rank. 

The  word  "  baudekin"  itself  became  at  last  enlarged  in  its 
meaning.    So  warm,  so  mellow,  so  fast  were  the  tones  of  crimson. 


42 


TEXTILES. 


which  the  dyers  of  Bagdad  knew  how  to  give  their  silks  that, 
without  a  thread  of  gold  in  them,  the  mere  glowing  tints  of  the 
plain  crimson  silken  webs  won  for  themselves  the  name  of  baude- 
kins.  Furthermore,  when  they  quite  ceased  to  be  partly  woven 
in  gold  and  from  their  ' consequent  lower  price  and  cheapness 
•came  into  use  for  cloths  of  estate  over  royal  thrones,  the  canopy 
hung  over  the  high  altar  of  a  church  acquired  and  yet  keeps 
the  appellation  (at  least  in  Italy)  of  "  baldachino." 

How  very  full  in  size,  how  costly  in  materials  and  embroidery, 
must  have  sometimes  been  the  cloth  of  estate  spread  overhead 
and  behind  the  throne  of  our  kings,  may  be  gathered  from  the 
privy  purse  expenses  of  Henry  the  seventh;  wherein  this  item 
•occurs  :  "To  Antony  Corsse  for  a  cloth  of  an  estate  conteyning 
47 J  yerds,  £n  the  yerd,  £522  Canopies  of  this  kind  are 

still  occasionally  to  be  seen  in  the  throne-room  of  some  of  the 
Roman  palaces,  whose  owners  have  the  old  feudal  right  to  the 
cloth  of  estate. 

The  custom  itself  is  thus  noticed  by  Chaucer  : 

Yet  nere  and  nere  forth  in  I  gan  me  dress 

Into  an  hall  of  noble  apparaile, 

With  arras  spred,  and  cloth  of  gold  I  gesse, 

And  other  silke  of  easier  availe : 

Under  the  cloth  of  their  estate  sauns  faile 

The  king  and  quene  there  sat  as  I  beheld. 

This  same  rich  golden  stuff  had  a  third  and  even  better 
known  name,  to  be  found  all  through  our,  early  literature  as  Cloth 
«of  PalL 

The  state  cloak  (in  Latin  pallium,  in  Anglo-saxon  paell), 
worn  alike  by  men  as  well  as  women,  was  always  made  of  the 
most  gorgeous  stuff  that  could  be  found.  From  a  very  early 
period  in  the  mediaeval  ages  golden  webs  shot  in  silk  with  one  or 
other  of  the  various  colours,  occasionally  blue  but  oftener  crim- 
rson,  were  sought  for  through  so  many  years,  and  everywhere,  that 
at  last  each  sort  of  cloth  of  gold  had  given  to  it  the  name  of 


TEXTILES. 


43 


"  pall,"  no  matter  the  immediate  purpose  to  which  it  might  have 
to  be  applied  or  after  what  fashion.  Vestments  for  sacred  use 
and  garments  for  knights  and  ladies  were  equally  made  of  it. 
The  word  is  common  enough  in  the  church  inventories. 

As  to  worldly  use,  the  king's  daughter  in  the  6  Squire  of  low 
degree '  had 

Mantell  of  ryche  degre 
Purple  palle  and  armyne  fre : 

and  in  the  poem  of  Sir  Isumbras — 

The  rich  queen  in  hall  was  set ; 
Knights  her  served,  at  hand  and  feet 
In  rich  robes  of  pall. 

For  ceremonial  receptions  our  kings  used  to  order  that  every 
house  should  be  "  curtained  "  along  the  streets  which  the  pro- 
cession would  have  to  take  through  London,  "  incortinaretur.,, 
How  this  was  done  we  learn  from  Chaucer  in  the  '  Knight's 
tale ' ; 

By  ordinance,  thurghout  the  cite  large 
Hanged  with  cloth  of  gold,  and  not  with  sarge ; 

as  well  as  from  the  '  Life  of  Alexander 

Al  theo  city  was  by-hong 

Of  riche  baudekyns  and  pellis  (palls)  among. 

Hence,  when  Elizabeth,  queen  of  Henry  the  seventh,  "  proceeded 
from  the  towre  throwge  the  citie  of  London  (for  her  coronation) 
to  Westminster,  al  the  strets  ther  wich  she  shulde  passe  by,  were 
clenly  dressed  and  besene  with  clothes  of  tappestreye  and  arras. 
And  some  strets,  as  Cheepe,  hangged  with  rich  clothes  of  gold, 
velvetts,  and  silks,  etc."  Machyn  in  his  diary  tells  us  that  as 
late  as  1555  "  Bow  chyrche  in  London  was  hangyd  with  cloth  of 
gold  and  with  ryche  hares  (arras)." 

Both  in  England  and  abroad,  it  was  customary  in  the  middle 
ages  to  provide  richly  decorated  palls  with  which  to  cover  the 
biers  of  dead  people  :  more  especially  the  members  of  various 
guilds.    Some  of  these  are  still  existing ;  one,  belonging  to  the 


Mortuary  Cloth  from  the  church  of  Folleville  (Sommc),  now  in  the  museum  at  Amiens. 


TEXTILES. 


45 


London  fishmongers'  company ;  another,  of  the  fifteenth  century, 
is  in  the  museum  at  Amiens, 

A  celebrated  Mohammedan  writer,  Ebn-Khaldoun,  who  died 
about  the  middle  of  the  fifteenth  century,  while  speaking  of 
that  spot  in  an  Arab  palace,  the  "  Tiraz,"  so  designated  from 
the  name  itself  of  the  rich  silken  stuffs  therein  woven,  tells  us 
that  one  of  the  privileges  of  the  Saracenic  kings  was  to  have 
the  name  of  the  prince  himself,  or  the  special  ensign  chosen 
by  his  house,  woven  into  the  stuffs  intended  for  his  personal 
wear,  whether  wrought  of  silk,  brocade,  or  even  coarser  kind  of 
silk.  While  gearing  his  loom  the  workman  contrived  that  the 
letters  of  the  title  should  come  out  either  in  threads  of  gold, 
or  in  silk  of  another  colour  from  that  of  the  ground.  The 
royal  apparel  thus  bore  about  it  its  own  especial  marks,  and 
distinguished  not  only  the  sovereign  but  those  personages 
around  him  who  were  allowed  by  their  official  rank  in  his 
court  to  wear  it;  or  those  again  upon  whom  he  had  bestowed 
rich  garments  as  especial  tokens  of  the  imperial  favour,  like 
the  modern  pelisse  of  honour.  Before  the  time  of  Mahomet 
the  eastern  princes  used  to  have  woven  upon  the  stuffs  wrought 
for  their  personal  use,  or  as  gifts  to  others,  their  own  especial 
likeness,  or  at  times  the  peculiar  ensign  of  their  royalty.  But 
afterwards  the  custom  was  changed  and  names  were  substituted, 
to  which  words  were  added  foreboding  good  or  certain  formulas 
of  praise.  Wherever  the  Moslem  ruled  the  practice  was  intro- 
duced ;  and  thus,  whether  in  Asia,  in  Egypt,  or  other  parts  of 
Africa,  or  in  Moorish  Spain,  the  silken  garments  for  royalty 
and  its  favourites  showed  woven  in  them  the  prince's  name, 
or  his  chosen  text.  The  robes  wrought  in  Egypt  for  the  far- 
famed  Saladin,  and  worn  by  him  as  caliph,  bore  very  con- 
spicuously upon  them  the  name  of  that  conqueror. 

In  the  old  lists  of  church  ornaments  frequent  mention  is 
found  of  vestments  inscribed  with  words  in  real  or  pretended 
Arabic ;  and  when  St.   Paul's  inventory  more  than  once  speaks 


46  TEXTILES, 

of  silken,  stuffs  "  de  opere  Saraceno  "  it  is  not  improbable  that 
some  at  least  of  those  textiles  were  so  called  from  having 
Arabic  characters  woven  on  them.  Such,  too,  were  the  letters 
on  the  red  pall  figured  with  elephants  and  a  bird,  belonging  in 
the  fourteenth  century  to  the  cathedral  at  Exeter.  Somewhat 
later,  our  trade  with  the  south  of  Spain  led  us  to  call  such 
words  on  woven  stuffs  Moorish :  thus,  Joane  lady  Bergavenny 
bequeaths  (1434)  a  "  hullyng  (hangings  for  a  hall)  of  black 
red  and  green,  with  morys  letters,  etc." 


Silk  damask  (Sicilian)  with  imitated  Arabic  letters. 


TEXTILES.  \ 

V    \  fit 

The  weaving  of  letters  in  textiles  is  neither  a  Moorish;  nor 
Saracenic  invention;  ages  before,  the  ancient  Parthians  used*  to 
do  so,  as  we  learn  from  Pliny:  "Parthi  literas  vestibus  intexunt." 
A  curious  illustration  of  the  frequent  use  of  silken  stuffs  bearing 
letters,  borrowed  from  some  real  or  supposed  oriental  alphabet, 
is  the  custom  which  many  of  the  illuminators  had  of  figuring  on 
frontals  and  altar  canopies,  evidently  intended  to  represent  silk, 
meaningless  words;  and  the  artists  of  Italy  up  to  the  middle 
of  the  sixteenth  century  did  the  same  on  the  hems  of  the' 
garments  worn  by  great  personages,  in  their  paintings. 

The  eagle,  single  and  double-headed,  may  frequently  be 
found  in  the  patterns  of  old  silks.  In  all  ages  certain  birds  of 
prey  have  been  looked  upon  by  heathens  as  ominous  for  good 
or  evil.  Upon  the  standard  which  was  carried  at  the  head  of 
the  Danish  invaders  of  Northumbria  was  figured  the  raven,  the 
bird  of  Odin.  This  banner  had  been  worked  by  the  daughters 
of  Regnar  Lodbrok,  in  one  noontide's  while;  and  it  is  re- 
corded by  Asser  that  if  victory  was  to  follow,  the  raven  would 
seem  to  stand  erect  and  as  if  about  to  soar  before  the  warriors ; 
but  if  a  defeat  was  impending,  the  raven  hung  his  head  and 
drooped  his  wings.  Another  and  a  more  important  flag,  that 
which  Harold  fought  under  at  Hastings,  is  described  by 
Malmesbury  as  having  been  embroidered  in  gold  with  the  figure 
of  a  man  in  the  act  of  fighting,  and  studded  with  precious 
stones,  woven  sumptuously. 

In  still  earlier  ages  the  eagle,  known  for  its  daring  and  its 
lofty  flight,  was  held  in  high  repute  ;  as  the  emblem  of  power 
and  victory  it  is  to  be  seen  flying  in  triumph  over  the  head 
of  some  Assyrian  conqueror,  as  may  be  witnessed  in  Layard's 
work  on  Nineveh.  Homer  calls  it  the  bird  of  Jove.  Quintus 
Curtius  says  that  a  golden  eagle  was  carved  upon  the  yoke  of 
the  war  chariot  of  king  Darius,  as  if  outstretching  his  wings. 
The  Romans  bore  the  bird  upon  their  standards ;  the  Byzantine 
emperors  kept  it  as  their  device;  and,  following  the  ancient 


48 


TEXTILES. 


traditions  of  the  east  and  heedless  of  their  law  that  forbids  the 
making  of  images,  the  Saracens,  especially  when  they  ruled  in 
Egypt,  had  the  eagle  figured  on  several  things  about  them,  some- 
times single  at  others  double-headed,  which  latter  was  the 
shape  adopted  by  the  emperors  of  Germany  as  their  blazon ;  in 
which  form  it  is  borne  to  this  day  by  several  reigning  houses. 
It  is  not  strange,  therefore,  that  eagles  of  both  fashions  are  so 
often  to  be  observed  woven  upon  ancient  and  eastern  textiles. 

As  early  as  1277  Exeter  cathedral  reckoned  among  her 
vestments  several  so  decorated  •  for  instance,  a  cope  of  bau- 
dekin  figured  with  small  two-headed  eagles  :  and  Richard  king 
of  Germany,  brother  of  Henry  the  third  of  England,  gave  to 
the  same  church  a  cope  of  black  baudekin  with  eagles  in  gold 
figured  on  it.  These  are  recorded  in  the  inventories  printed  by 
Dr.  Oliver;  and  many  like  instances  might  be  noticed  in  other 
lists. 


Ladies  carding  and  spinning;  from  MSS.  of  the  fourteenth  century,  in  the  British 

museum. 


CHAPTER  VI. 


Hitherto  no  attempt  has  been  made  to  distribute  olden  silken 
textiles  into  various  schools ;  but  the  numerous  specimens  in  the 
admirable  collection  at  South  Kensington  enable  us  to  separate 
them  into  several  groups — Chinese,  Persian,  Byzantine,  Indian, 
Syrian,  Saracenic,  Moresco-Spanish,  Sicilian,  Italian,  Flemish, 
British,  and  French.  We  shall  now  especially  refer  to  that 
collection. 

The  Chinese  examples  are  not  many :  but,  whether  plain  or 
figured,  they  are  beautiful  in  their  own  way.  From  all  that  we 
know  of  the  people,  we  are  led  to  believe  that  their  style  two 
thousand  years  ago  is  the  same  still ;  so  that  the  web  wrought  by 
them  this  year  or  three  hundred  years  ago,  like  no.  1368,  would  differ 
hardly  in  a  line  from  their  far  earlier  textiles  ;  of  which  Dionysius 
Periegetes  wrote  that  "  the  Seres  make  precious  figured  garments, 
resembling  in  colour  the  flowers  of  the  field,  and  rivalling  in  fine- 
ness the  work  of  spiders."  In  these  stuffs,  warp  and  woof  are  of 
silk  and  both  of  the  best  kinds. 

Persian  textiles,  as  we  see  them  at  South  Kensington,  must 
also  have  been  for  many  centuries  very  much  the  same  in  design 
and  character.  Sometimes  the  design  is  made  up  of  various  kinds 
of  beasts  and  birds,  real  or  imaginary,  with  the  sporting  cheetah 
spotted  among  them ;  and  the  "  homa  "  or  tree  of  life  conspi- 
cuously set  above  all.    In  such  cases  we  may  conclude  that  the 


TEXTILES. 


web  was  wrought  by  Persians,  and  generally  the  textile  will  be 
found  in  all  its  parts  to  be  of  the  richest  materials. 

No.  8233,  may  be  referred  to  as  an  illustration  of  the  Persian' 
type. 

A  school  of  design  sprung  up  among  the  Byzantine  Greeks,, 
from  the  time  when  in  the  sixth  century  they  began  to  weave 
home-grown  silk,  which  retained  not  a  little  of  the  beauty,  breadth, 
and  flowing  outline  of  ancient  art.  Together  with  this,  a  strong 
feeling  of  Christianity  showed  itself  as  well  in  many  of  the 
subjects  which  they  took  out  of  holy  writ  as  in  the  smaller 
elements  of  ornamentation.  Figures,  whether  of  the  human  form 
or  of  beasts,  are  given  in  a  much  larger  and  bolder  size  than  on 
any  other  ancient  stuffs.  Though  there  are  not  many  known 
specimens  from  the  old  looms  of  Constantinople  there  is  one, 
no.  7036,  showing  Samson  wrestling  with  a  lion,  which  may  serve 
as  a  type.  In  the  year  1295  St.  Paul's  cathedral  would  seem  to 
have  possessed  several  vestments  made  of  Byzantine  silk.  A 
very  splendid  dalmatic  of  Byzantine  silk,  probably  of  the  twelfth 
century,  is  preserved  in  the  treasury  of  St.  Peter's  at  Rome.  The 
colour  is  dark  blue,  and  the  embroidery  in  gold  and  colours. 

The  specimens  at  South  Kensington  from  the  Byzantine  and 
later  Greek  loom  are  not  to  be  taken  as  by  any  means  first-rate 
examples  of  its  general  production.  They  are  poor  both  in 
material  and,  when  figured,  in  design.  There  are,  however,  many 
pieces:  nos.  1241,  1246,  1257,  1266,  etc. 

Indian  ancient  silks  and  textiles  have  their  own  distinctive 
marks. 

From  Marco  Polo,  who  wandered  much  over  the  far  east  some 
time  during  the  thirteenth  century,  we  learn  that  the  weaving  in 
India  was  done  by  women  who  wrought  in  silk  and  gold,  after  a 
noble  manner,  beasts  and  birds  upon  their  webs  : — "  Le  loro 
donne  lavorano  tutte  cose  a  seta  e  ad  oro  e  a  uccelli  e  a  bestie 
nobilmente  e  lavorano  di  cortine  ed  altre  cose  molto  ricamente." 

Several  of  the  South  Kensington  mediaeval  specimens  from 


52 


TEXTILES. 


Tartary  and  Jndia  show  well  the  truthfulness  of  the  great  Venetian 
traveller,  while  speaking  about  the  textiles  which  he  saw  in  those 
countries.  The  dark  purple  piece  of  silk  figured  in  gold  with  birds 
and  beasts  of  the  thirteenth  century,  no.  7086,  is  good;  but 
better  still  is  the  shred  of  blue  damask,  no.  7087,  with  its  birds, 
its  animals,  and  flowers  wrought  in  gold  and  different  coloured 
silks.  India,  also,  has  ever  been  famous  for  its  cloud-like 
transparent  muslins,  which  since  Marco  Polo's  days  have  kept 
that  oriental  name,  through  being  better  woven  at  Mosul  than 
elsewhere. 

The  Syrian  school  is  well  represented  at  South  Kensington  by 
several  fine  pieces. 

The  whole  sea-board  of  that  part  of  Asia-minor,  as  well  as  far 
inland,  was  inhabited  by  a  mixture  of  Jews,  Christians,  and 
Saracens;  and  all  were  workers  in  silk.  The  reputation  of  the 
neighbouring  Persia  had  of  old  stood  high  for  the  beauty  and 
durability  of  her  silken  textiles,  which  caused  them  to  be  sought  for 
by  the  European  traders.  Persia's  outlet  to  the  west  for  her  goods 
lay  through  the  great  commercial  ports  on  the  coast  of  Syria. 
Persia  was  accustomed  to  set  her  own  peculiar  seal  upon  her 
figured  webs,  by  mingling  in  her  designs  the  mystic  "  homa  : " 
and,  naturally,  this  part  of  the  pattern  became  in  the  eyes  of 
Europeans,  at  first,  a  sort  of  assurance  that  those  goods  had  been 
made  in  Persian  looms.  By  one  of  the  tricks  of  imitation  fol- 
lowed in  that  day,  as  well  as  now,  the  Syrian  designers  threw  the 
"  homa  "  into  their  patterns.  Borrowed  perhaps  originally  from 
Hebrew  tradition,  this  symbol  of  "  the  tree  of  life  "  had  in  it 
nothing  objectionable  either  to  the  Christian,  the  Jew,  or  the 
Moslem  :  all  three,  therefore,  took  it  and  made  it  a  leading 
portion  of  design  in  the  patterns  of  their  silks ;  and  hence  it  is 
that  we  meet  with  it  so  often.  Though  at  the  beginning,  it  may  be, 
done  with  a  fraudulent  intention  of  palming  on  the  world  Syrian 
for  Persian  silks,  the  Syrians  usually  put  also  into  their  fabrics  a 
something  which  declared  the  real  workmanship.  Mixed  with  the 


TEXTILES. 


53 


"  homa,"  the  "  cheetah/ '  and  other  elements  of  Persian  patterns, 
the  discordant  two-handled  vase  or  the  badly-imitated  Arabic 
sentence  betrays  the  textile  to  be  not  Persian  but  Syrian.  No. 
8359  exemplifies  this.  Furthermore,  probably  in  ignorance  about 
Persia's  superstitious  use  of  the  "homa"  in  her  old  religious 
services,  the  Christian  weavers  of  Syria  put  the  sign  of  the  cross 
by  the  side  of  the  "  tree  of  life : "  as  we  find  upon  the  piece  of 
silk,  no.  7094.  Another  remarkable  specimen  of  the  Syrian  loom 
is  no.  7034,  whereon  the  Nineveh  lions  come  forth  conspicuously. 
As  good  examples  of  well-wrought  "  diaspron "  or  diaper, 
no.  8233  and  no.  7052  may  be  mentioned. 

Saracenic  weaving,  as  shown  by  the  design  upon  the  web,  is 
exemplified  in  several  specimens  at  South  Kensington. 

However  much  against  what  looks  like  a  heedlessness  of  the 
teaching  of  the  Koran,  it  is  certain  that  the  Saracens,  those  of  the 
upper  classes  in  particular,  felt  no  difficulty  in  wearing  robes  upon 
which  animals  and  the  likenesses  of  created  things  were  woven  ; 
with  the  strictest  of  their  princes  a  double-headed  eagle,  possibly 
borrowed  from  the  crusaders,  was  a  royal  heraldic  device.  Stuffs 
figured  with  birds  and  beasts,  with  trees  and  flowers,  were  not  the 
less  on  that  account  of  Saracenic  workmanship,  and  meant  for 
Moslem  wear.  What,  however,  may  be  chiefly  looked  for  upon 
Saracenic  textures  is  a  pattern  consisting  of  longitudinal  stripes 
of  blue,  red,  green,  and  other  colour  •  some  of  them  charged  with 
animals,  small  in  form ;  some  written,  in  large  Arabic  letters,  with 
a  word  or  sentence. 

Moresco-Spanish  or  Saracenic  textiles  wrought  in  Spain,  though 
partaking  of  the  striped  pattern  and  bearing  words  in  real  or 
imitated  Arabic,  had  some  distinctions  of  their  own.  The  designs 
shown  upon  these  stuffs  are  almost  always  drawn  out  of  strap- 
work,  reticulations,  or  some  combination  of  geometrical  lines, 
amid  which  are  occasionally  to  be  found  different  forms  of  conven- 
tional flowers.  Sometimes,  but  very  rarely,  the  crescent  moon  is 
figured  as  in  the  curious  piece,  no.  8639.    The  colours  of  these 


54 


TEXTILES. 


silks  are  usually  either  a  fine  crimson  or  a  deep  blue  with  almost 
always  a  fine  toned  yellow  as  a  ground.  But  one  remarkable 
feature  in  these  Moresco-Spanish  textiles  is  the  presence  of  the 
ingenious  imitation  (before  spoken  of)  of  gold ;  for  which  shreds 
of  gilded  parchment  cut  up  into  narrow  flat  strips  are  substituted 
and  woven  with  the  silk.  This,  when  fresh,  must  have  looked 
very  bright,  and  have  given  the  web  all  the  appearance  of  the 
favourite  stuffs  called  here  in  England  "  tissues."  The  fraud,  as 
already  explained,  if  fraud  it  were,  is  not  easily  discovered 
without  a  magnifying  glass.  A  guide  may  be  found  in  the 
blackness  of  the  gold.  Nos.  7095,  8590,  and  8639,  are 
examples  of  this  gilded  vellum. 

The  Sicilian  school  strongly  marked  wide  differences  between 
itself  and  all  the  others  which  had  lived  before ;  and  the  history 
of  its  loom  is  as  interesting  as  it  is  varied. 

The  first  to  teach  the  natives  of  Sicily  how  to  rear  the  silkworm 
and  spin  its  silk  were,  as  it  would  seem,  the  Mahomedans,  who 
coming  over  from  Africa  brought  with  them,  besides  the  art  of 
weaving  silken  textiles,  a  knowledge  of  the  fauna  of  that  vast 
continent — its  giraffes,  its  antelopes,  its  gazelles,  its  lions,  its 
elephants.  These  invaders  told  them  also  of  the  parrots  of  India 
and  the  hunting  sort  of  leopard, — the  cheetahs ;  and  when  the 
stuff  was  wrought  for  European  wear  both  beast  and  bird  were 
imaged  upon  the  web,  and  at  the  same  time  a  word  in  Arabic  was 
woven  in.  Like  ail  other  Saracens,  those  in  Sicily  loved  to  mingle 
gold  in  their  tissues ;  and,  to  spare  the  silk,  cotton  thread  was 
not  unfrequently  worked  up  in  the  warp.  When,  therefore,  we 
meet  with  beasts  taken  from  the  fauna  of  Africa,  such,  especially, 
as  the  giraffe  and  the  several  classes  of  the  antelope  family,  with 
perhaps  also  an  Arabic  motto,  and  part  of  the  pattern  wrought  in 
gold,  as  well  as  cotton  in  the  warp,  we  may  fairly  take  the  specimen 
as  a  piece  of  Sicily's  work  in  its  first  period  of  weaving  silk. 

The  second  epoch  was  when  in  the  twelfth  century  Roger, 
king  of  Sicily,  took  Corinth,  Thebes,  and  Athens;  from  each  of 


TEXTILES. 


55 


which  cities  he  led  away  captives  all  the  men  and  women  he  could 
find  who  knew  how  to  weave  silks,  and  carried  them  to  Palermo. 
These  Grecian  new  comers  brought  fresh  designs  which  were 
adopted  sometimes  wholly,  at  others  but  in  part  and  mixed  up 
with  the  older  Saracenic  style.  In  this  second  period  of  the 
island's  loom  we  discover  what  traces  the  Byzantine  school  im- 
pressed upon  Sicilian  silks,  and  helped  so  much  to  alter  the  type 
of  their  first  designs.  On  one  silk,  the  pattern  is  a  grotesque 
mask  amid  the  graceful  twinings  of  luxuriant  foliage,  such  as  might 
have  been  then  found  upon  many  a  fragment  of  old  Greek  sculpture; 
this  may  be  seen  on  no.  8241  ;  on  another,  a  sovereign  on  horse- 
back wearing  the  royal  crown  and  carrying  a  hawk  upon  his 
wrist,  as  in  no.  8589 ;  on  a  third,  no.  8234,  is  the  Greek  cross, 
with  a  pattern  much  like  the  old  netted  or  "  de  fundato  ,;  kind 
which  has  been  described,  p.  38. 

But  Sicily's  third  is  quite  her  own  peculiar  style.  At  the  end 
of  the  thirteenth  and  beginning  of  the  fourteenth  century  she 
struck  into  an  untried  path.  Without  throwing  aside  the  old 
elements  employed  by  the  Mahomedans  Sicily  put  with  them  the 
emblem  of  Christianity,  the  cross,  in  various  forms>  on  some 
occasions  with  the  letter  V.  four  times  repeated. 

From  the  east  to  the  uttermost  western  borders  of  the 
Mediterranean  the  weavers  of  every  country  had  been  in  the 
habit  of  figuring  upon  their  silks  those  beasts  and  birds  they  saw 
around  them  :  the  Tartar,  the  Indian,  and  the  Persian  gave  us  the 
parrot  and  the  cheetah ;  the  Africans,  the  giraffe  and  the  gazelle  ; 
the  people  of  each  continent,  the  lions,  the  elephants,  the  eagles, 
and  the  other  birds  common  to  both.  From  the  sculpture  of  the 
Greeks  and  Romans  the  Sicilians  could  have  easily  copied  the 
fabled  griffin  and  the  centaur ;  but  it  was  left  for  their  own  wild 
imaginings  to  figure  such  an  odd  compound  in  one  being  as  the 
animal— half  elephant,  half  griffin — which  we  see  in  no.  1288. 
Their  daring  flights  of  fancy  in  coupling  the  difficult  with  the 
beautiful  are  curious;  in  one  piece  large  eagles  are  perched  in 


56 


TEXTILES. 


pairs  with  a  radiating  sun  between  them,  and  beneath  are  dogs, 
in  pairs,  running  with  heads  turned  back  ;  in  another,  running 
harts  have  caught  one  of  their  hind  legs  in  a  cord  tied  to  their 
collar,  and  an  eagle  swoops  down  upon  them;  and  the  same 
animal,  in  another  place  on  the  same  piece,  has  switched  its  tail 
into  the  last  link  of  a  chain  fastened  to  its  neck;  on  a  third 
sample  are  harts,  the  letter  M  floriated,  winged  lions,  crosses 
floriated,  crosses  sprouting  out  on  two  sides  with  fleurs-de-lis,  and 
four-legged  monsters,  some  like  winged  lions,  some  biting  their 
tails.  Hardly  elsewhere  to  be  found  are  certain  elements  pecu- 
liar to  the  patterns  upon  silks  from  mediaeval  Sicily;  such,  for 
instance,  as  harts,  and  demi-dogs  with  very  large  wings,  both 
animals  having  remarkably  long  manes  streaming  far  behind  them  ; 
or  harts  lodged  under  green  trees  in  a  park  with  paling  about  it. 
The  hawk,  the  eagle,  double  and  single  headed,  or  the  parrot, 
may  be  found  on  stuffs  all  over  the  east ;  not  so,  however,  the 
swan,  which  was  a  favourite  with  Sicilians  and  may  be  seen  often 
drawn  with  much  gracefulness. 

The  Sicilians  showed  their  strong  affection  for  certain  plants 
and  flowers.  On  a  great  many  of  the  silks  in  the  South  Kensing- 
ton collection  from  Palermitan  looms  we  see  figured  upon  a 
tawny  coloured  grounding  beautifully  drawn  foliage  in  green ; 
sometimes  vine  leaves,  sometimes  what  looks  like  parsley,  so 
curled,  crispy,  and  serrated  are  its  leaves.  Another  peculiarity 
is  the  introduction  of  the  letter  U,  repeated  so  as  to  mark  the 
feathering  upon  the  tails  of  birds ;  or  to  fall  into  the  shape  of  an 
O;  as  in  nos.  8591,  8599. 

Whether  it  was  that  the  crusaders  made  Sicily  so  often  the 
halting  spot  on  their  way  to  the  holy  land,  or  that  knights 
crowded  there  for  other  purposes,  and  thus  dazzled  the  eyes  of  the 
islanders  with  the  bravery  of  their  armorial  bearings,  it  is  certain 
that  the  Sicilians  were  particularly  given  to  introduce  many 
heraldic  charges — wyverns,  eagles,  lions  rampant,  and  griffins— 
into  their  designs.   The  occasions  in  which  such  elements  of 


Silk  damask — Sicilian  :  fourteenth- century. 


5* 


TEXTILES. 


blazoning  come  in  are  so  numerous  that  one  of  the  features 
belonging  to  the  Sicilian  loom  in  its  third  period  is  that,  bating 
tinctures,  it  is  decidedly  heraldic. 

All  this  beauty  and  happiness  of  invention,  set  forth  by  bold, 
free,  spirited  drawing,  were  bestowed  too  often  upon  stuffs  of  a 
very  poor  inferior  quality,  in  which  the  gold  if  not  actually  base 
was  always  scanty,  and  a  good  deal  of  cotton  was  wrought  up  with 
the  silk. 

Till  within  a  few  years  past  the  royal  manufactory  at  Sta. 
Leucia,  near  Naples,  produced  silks  of  remarkable  richness ;  and 
the  piece,  no.  721,  does  credit  to  its  loom,  as  it  wove  in  the  seven- 
teenth century.  Northern  Italy  was  not  idle ;  and  the  looms 
which  she  set  up  in  several  of  her  great  cities,  in  Lucca,  Florence, 
Genoa,  Venice,  and  Milan,  earned  for  themselves  a  good  repute 
and  a  wide  trade  for  their  gold  and  silver  tissues,  their  velvets, 
and  their  figured  silken  textiles.  Yet,  in  the  same  way  as  each 
of  these  free  states  had  its  own  accent  and  provincialisms  in 
speech,  so  also  had  it  a  something  often  thrown  into  its  designs 
and  style  of  drawing  which  told  of  the  place  and  province  whence 
the  textiles  came. 

Lucca  at  an  early  period  made  herself  known  in  Europe  for 
her  textiles  ;  but  her  workmen,  like  those  of  Sicily,  seem  to  have 
thought  themselves  bound  to  follow  the  style  brought  by  the 
Saracens  of  figuring  parrots  and  peacocks,  gazelles,  and  even 
cheetahs,  as  we  see  in  the  specimens  no.  8258  and  no.  8616. 
But  with  these  eastern  animals  she  mixed  up  emblems  of  her  own, 
such  as  angels  clothed  in  white.  She  soon  dropped  what  was 
oriental  from  her  patterns  which  she  began  to  draw  in  a  larger, 
bolder  manner,  and  showing  an  inclination  for  light  blue  as  a 
colour. 

As  in  other  places  abroad  so  at  Lucca  cloths  of  gold  and  of 
•silver  were  often  wrought,  and  the  Lucchese  cloths  of  this  costly 
sort  were  in  much  request  in  England  during  the  fourteenth  cen- 
tury.   In  all  likelihood  they  were  not  of  the  deadened  but  the 


TEXTILES. 


59 


sparkling  kind,  afterwards  especially  known  as  "  tissue."  Exeter 
cathedral,  in  1327,  had  a  cope  of  silver  tissue,  or  cloth  of  Lucca  : — 
"de  panno  de  Luk."  At  a  later  date,  belonging  to  the  same 
church,  were  two  fine  chasubles — one  purple,  the  other  red— of  the 
same  glittering  stuff:  "  de  purpyll  panno."  York  cathedral  pos- 
sessed many  copes  of  tissue  shot  with  every  colour  required  by 
its  ritual,  and  among  them  were  "  a  reade  cope  of  clothe  of  tishewe 
with  orphry  of  pearl,  a  cope  with  orphrey,  a  cope  of  raised  clothe 
ofgoulde,"  making  a  distinction  between  tissue  and  the  ordinary 
cloth  of  gold.  In  the  wardrobe  accounts  of  Edward  the  second 
the  golden  tissue,  or  Lucca  cloth,  is  several  times  mentioned. 
Whether  the  ceremony  happened  to  be  sad  or  gay  this  glittering 
web  was  used ;  palls  made  of  Lucca  cloth  were,  at  masses  for  the 
dead,  strewed  over  the  corpse ;  at  marriages  the  care-cloth  was 
made  of  the  same  stuff :  thus  when  Richard  de  Arundell  and 
Isabella,  Hugh  le  Despenser's  daughter,  had  been  wedded  at  the 
door  of  the  royal  chapel,  the  veil  held  spread  out  over  their  heads 
as  they  knelt  inside  the  chancel  during  the  nuptial  mass  was  of 
Lucca  cloth. 

About  the  same  time  velvet  became  known,  and  came  into  use 
both  for  vestments  and  for  personal  wear ;  and  Lucca  probably 
was  among  the  first  places  in  Europe  to  weave  it.  The  specimens 
at  South  Kensington  of  this  fine  textile  from  Lucchese  looms, 
though  few  in  comparison  with  those  from  Genoa,  still  have  a 
certain  historical  value  for  the  English  workman:  no.  1357,  with 
its  olive  green  plain  silken  ground  and  trailed  all  over  with 
flowers  and  leaves  in  a  somewhat  deeper  tone,  and  the  earlier 
example,  no.  8322,  with  its  ovals  and  feathering  stopped  with 
graceful  cusps  and  artichokes,  afford  us  good  instances  of  what 
Lucca  could  produce  in  the  way  of  artistic  velvets. 

Genoa,  though  in  mediaeval  times  not  so  conspicuous  as  she 
afterwards  became  for  her  textile  industry,  encouraged  over  her 
narrow  territory  the  weaving  of  silken  webs.  Of  these  the  earliest 
mention  we  have  found  is  in  the  inventory  of  vestments  belonging 


6o 


TEXTILES. 


to  St.  Paul's  cathedral,  London,  in  1295  :  besides  a  cope  of  Genoa, 
cloth  that  church  had,  of  the  same  manufacture,  a  hanging  pat- 
terned with  wheels  and  two-headed  birds.  Though  this  first 
description  be  scant,  we  may  reasonably  gather  that  the  Genoese 
cloths  must  have  resembled  the  textiles  wrought  at  Lucca.  Genoa 
still  keeps  up  her  old  reputation  for  beautiful  velvets. 

In  the  collection  at  South  Kensington  there  are  examples  of 
every  kind  of  Genoese  velvets ;  some  with  a  smooth  unbroken 
surface,  some  elaborately  patterned  and  showing,  together  with 
wonderful  skill  in  the  weaving,  much  beauty  of  design.  Some 
are  raised  or  cut,  the  design  being  worked  in  a  pile  standing  well 
up  by  itself  out  of  a  flat  ground  of  silk,  either  of  the  same  or 
of  another  colour,  and  not  unfrequently  wrought  in  gold.  No. 
7795  is  an  example  of  a  very  costly  kind;  in  which  the  ground  is 
velvet,  and  again  of  velvet  is  the  pattern  itself  but  raised  one  pile 
higher  than  the  other,  so  as  to  show  its  form  and  shape  distinctly. 
No.  8323  shows  how  the  design  was  worked  in  various  coloured 
velvet.  This  last  was  a  favourite  in  England  and  called  motley  ; 
in  his  will,  1415,  printed  in  Rymers  Fcedera,  Henry  lord  Scrope 
bequeathed  two  vestments,  one,  motley  velvet  rubeo  de  auro  ;  the 
other,  motley  velvet  nigro,  rubeo  et  viridi,  etc. 

Venice  does  not  seem  to  have  been  at  any  time,  like  Sicily  and 
Lucca,  smitten  with  the  taste  of  imitating  in  her  looms  the  patterns 
which  she  saw  abroad  upon  textile  fabrics,  but  appears  to  have 
borrowed  from  the  orientals  only  one  kind  of  weaving  cloth  of 
gold  :  the  yellow  chasuble  at  Exeter  cathedral  in  1327,  figured 
with  beasts,  is  the  only  instance  we  know  where  she  wove  animals 
upon  silks.  Venice,  however,  set  up  for  herself  a  new  branch  of 
textiles,  and  wrought  for  church  use  square  webs  of  a  crimson 
ground  on  which  were  figured,  in  gold  or  on  yellow  silk,  subjects 
taken  from  the  Scriptures  or  the  persons  of  saints  and  angels. 
These  square  pieces  were  employed,  sewed  together,  as  frontals  to 
altars,  but  when  longwise  more  generally  as  orphreys  to  chasubles, 
copes,  and  other  vestments. 


TEXTILES. 


61 


There  is  a  remarkable  similarity  between  the  drawing  of  the 
figures  upon  old  Venetian  silks  and  the  woodcuts  in  books  pub- 
lished at  Venice  in  the  early  part  of  the  sixteenth  century ;  such 
as  the  fine  pontifical  by  Giunta,  or  the  "  Rosario "  by  Varisco. 
We  find  in  both  the  same  style  and  manner ;  the  same  broad  fold 
and  fall  of  drapery ;  the  same  plumpness  and  outline  of  the  human 
face  and  figure.  So  near  is  the  likeness  in  design  that  we  may 
almost  believe  that  the  artists  who  supplied  the  blocks  for  the 
printers  sketched  also  the  drawings  for  the  looms. 

By  the  fifteenth  century  Venice  knew  how  to  produce  good 
damasks  in  silk  and  gold :  if  we  had  nothing  more  than  the 
specimen,  no.  131 1,  where  St.  Mary  of  Egypt  is  so  well  represented, 
it  would  be  quite  enough  for  her  to  claim  for  herself  such  a  dis- 
tinction. Nor  can  there  be  much  doubt  that  Venice  wrought  in 
velvet ;  and  if  those  rich  stuffs  were  made  there,  sometimes  raised, 
sometimes  pile  upon  pile,  in  which  her  painters  loved  to  dress  the 
personages,  men  especially,  in  their  pictures,  then  Venetian  velvets 
were  certainly  beautiful.  Of  this  any  one  may  satisfy  himself  by 
one  visit  to  our  National  gallery.  There,  in  the  "  Adoration  of 
the  magi "  painted  by  Paulo  Veronese,  the  second  of  the  wise  men 
is  clad  in  a  robe  of  crimson  velvet,  cut  or  raised  after  a  design  in 
keeping  with  the  style  of  the  period. 

No  insignificant  article  of  Venetian  textile  workmanship  were 
her  laces  wrought  in  every  variety  •  in  gold,  in  silk,  in  thread. 
The  portrait  of  a  Doge  usually  shows  him  clothed  in  his  dress  of 
state.  His  wide  mantle,  with  large  golden  buttons,  is  made  of 
some  rich  dull  silver  cloth;  and  on  his  head  is  the  Phrygian- 
shaped  ducal  cap  bound  round  with  broad  gold  lace  diapered,  as 
we  see  in  the  bust  portrait  of  Loredano,  painted  by  John  Bellini, 
in  the  National  gallery.  Not  only  was  the  gold  in  the  thread 
particularly  good  but  the  lace  itself  in  great  favour  at  the  English 
court  at  one  time ;  bought,  not  by  yard  measure  but  by  weight, 
"  a  pounde  and  a  half  of  gold  of  Venys  "  was  employed  "  aboute 
the  making  of  a  lace  and  bo  tons  for  the  king's  man  tell  of  the 


62  TEXTILES. 

garter."  This  was  for  Henry  the  seventh.  "  Frenge  of  Venys 
gold"  appears  twice  in  the  wardrobe  accounts  of  Edward  the 
fourth.  Laces  in  worsted  or  in  linen  thread  wrought  by  the 
bobbin  at  Venice,  but  more  especially  her  point  laces  or  such  as 
were  done  with  the  needle,  always  had,  as  they  still  have,  a  great 
reputation. 

Venetian  linens,  for  fine  towelling  and  napery  in  general,  were 
in  favourite  use  in  France  during  a  part  of  the  fifteenth  century: 
In  the  '  Dues  de  Bourgogne'  by  Laborde,  more  than  once  we 
meet  with  such  an  entry  as  "  une  piece  de  nappes,  ouvraige  de 
Venise." 

Florence,  about  the  middle  of  the  fourteenth  century,  obtained 


Silk  damask — Florentine  :  fifteenth  century. 


TEXTILES. 

'  ■  .  \f       &  ~ 

a  place  in  the  foremost  rank  amid  the  weavers  of  northern  ftaiy.^ 

Specimens  of  her  earliest  handicraft  are  rare  ;  there  are  two  atLf* 

South  Kensington.    One  of  these,  no.  8563,  shows  the  excellence 

of  her  work  in  secular  silks.    Other  pieces  witness  to  the  delicacy 

of  her  design  at  a  later  time,  the  sixteenth  century.    The  orphrey^ 

webs  of  Florence  are  equally  conspicuous  for  drawing  and  skill  in 

weaving,  and  in  beauty  come  up  to  those  made  at  Venice,  far 

surpassing  anything  of  the  kind  ever  wrought  at  Cologne. 

But  it  was  of  her  velvets  that  Florence  was  warrantably  proud. 
Henry  the  seventh  bequeathed  "  to  God  and  St.  Peter,  and  to  the 
abbot  and  prior  and  convent  of  our  monastery  of  Westminster,  the 
whole  suit  of  vestments  made  at  Florence  in  Italy."  We  may  yet 
see  how  gorgeous  this  textile  was  in  one  of  these  Westminster 
abbey  copes  still  in  existence,  preserved  at  Stonyhurst  college. 
The  golden  ground  is  trailed  all  over  with  leaf-bearing  boughs  of 
a  bold  type,  in  raised  or  cut  ruby-toned  velvet  of  a  rich  soft  pile, 
which  is  freckled  with  gold  thread  sprouting  up  like  loops. 
Though  not  so  rich  in  material  nor  so  splendid  in  pattern,  there 
are  at  South  Kensington,  nos.  7792  and  7799,  two  specimens  of 
Florentine  cut  crimson  velvet  on  a  golden  ground,  like  the  royal 
vestments  in  their  kind  and  having  the  same  peculiarity,  the  little 
gold  thread  loop  shooting  out  of  the  velvet  pile.  These  pieces  are 
a  full  century  later  than  the  cope  at  Stonyhurst. 

That  peculiar  sort  of  ornamentation — the  little  loop  of  gold 
thread  standing  well  up  and  in  single  spots — upon  some  velvets, 
seems  at  times  to  have  been  replaced,  perhaps  with  the  needle,  by 
small  dots  of  solid  metal,  gold  or  silver  gilt,  upon  the  pile  :  of  the 
gift  of  one  of  its  bishops,  John  Grandisson,  Exeter  cathedral  had 
a  crimson  velvet  cope,  the  purple  velvet  orphrey  of  which  was  so- 
wrought  :  "  purpyll  velvette  worked  with  pynsheds  ,;  of  pure  gold. 

Milan,  though  now-a-days  she  stands  in  such  high  repute  for 
the  richness  and  beauty  of  her  silks  of  all  sorts,  was  not,  we  believe, 
at  any  period  during  mediaeval  times  as  famous  for  her  velvets,  her 
brocades,  or  cloths  of  gold,  as  for  her  armour,  so  strong  and  trust- 


64 


TEXTILES. 


worthy  for  the  field,  so  exquisitely  demascened  for  courtly  service. 
Still,  in  the  sixteenth  century,  she  earned  a  name  for  rich  cut 
velvets  as  may  be  seen  in  the  specimen,  no.  698 ;  for  her  silken 
net-work,  no.  8336,  which  may  have  led  the  way  to  weaving  silk 
stockings ;  and  for  her  laces  of  the  open  tinsel  kind  once  in  great 
vogue  for  both  sacred  and  secular  use,  as  in  no.  8331. 

England,  from  her  earliest  period,  had  textile  fabrics  varying  in 
design  and  material ;  the  colours  in  the  woollen  garments  worn  by 
each  of  the  three  several  classes  into  which  the  Bardic  order  was 
divided,  and  of  the  chequered  pattern  in  Boadicea's  cloak,  have 
been  already  mentioned.  It  would  seem  from  John  Garland, 
whose  witness  is  referred  to  above,  p.  12,  that  the  lighter  and  more 
tasteful  webs  wrought  here  came  from  women's  hands;  and  the 
loom,  one  of  which  must  have  been  in  almost  every  English  nun- 
nery and  homestead,  was  of  the  simplest  make. 

In  ancient  times  the  Egyptians  wove  in  an  upright  loom,  and 
beginning  at  top  so  as  to  weave  downwards  sat  at  their  work. 
In  Palestine  also  the  weaver  had  an  upright  loom,  but,  beginning 
at  bottom  and  working  upwards,  was  obliged  to  stand.  During 
the  mediaeval  period  the  loom  in  England  was  horizontal,  as  is 
shown  by  that  figured  in  the  Bedford  book  of  Hours  (preserved  in 
the  British  museum),  fol.  32  •  at  which  the  blessed  Virgin  is  seated 
weaving  curtains  for  the  temple. 

There  are  several  examples  at  South  Kensington  of  the  work 
of  English  women,  showing  the  excellence  of  their  handicraft  as 
well  as  elegance  in  design  during  the  thirteenth  century.  Nos. 
1233,  1256,  and  1270  may  be  referred  to.  But  for  specimens  of 
the  commoner  sorts  of  silken  textiles  and  of  wider  breadth,  which 
began  to  be  woven  in  this  country  under  Edward  the  third,  it  would  ^ 
be  hazardous  to  direct  the  reader.  Recent  examples,  velvets 
among  the  rest,  may  be  found  in  the  Brooke  collection.  To  some 
students  the  piece  of  old  English  printed  chintz,  no.  1622,  will 
not  be  without  an  interest. 

For  the  finer  sort  of  linen  napery  Evlisham  or  Ailesham  in 


TEXTILES.  65 

Lincolnshire  was  famous  during  the  fourteenth  century.  Exeter 
cathedral,  in  1327,  had  a  hand  towel  of  "  Ailesham  cloth. " 

Our  coarser  native  textiles  in  wool  or  in  thread,  or  in  both 
woven  together,  formed  a  stuff  called  "burel."  St.  Paul's  in 
1295  had  a  light  blue  chasuble,  and  Exeter  cathedral  in  1277  a 
long  pall  of  this  texture.  Burel  and,  in  short,  all  the  coarser 
kinds  of  work  were  wrought  by  men :  sometimes  in  monasteries. 
The  old  Benedictine  rule  obliged  the  monks  to  give  a  certain 
number  of  hours  every  week-day  to  hand-work,  either  at  home  or 
in  the  field. 

The  weaving  in  this  country  of  woollen  cloth,  as  a  staple 
branch  of  trade,  is  very  old.  Of  the  monks  at  Bath  abbey  we  are 
told  by  a  late  writer,  "  that  the  shuttle  and  the  loom  employed 
their  attention  (about  the  middle  of  the  fourteenth  century),  and 
under  their  active  auspices  the  weaving  of  woollen  cloth  (which 
made  its  appearance  in  England  about  the  year  1330,  and  received 
the  sanction  of  an  act  of  parliament  in  1337)  was  introduced, 
established,  and  brought  to  such  perfection  at  Bath  as  rendered 
the  city  one  of  the  most  considerable  in  the  west  of  England  for 
this  manufacture. "  Worcester  cloth  was  so  good  that,  by  a  chapter 
of  the  Benedictine  order  held  in  1422  at  Westminster  abbey,  it 
was  forbidden  to  be  worn  by  the  monks  and  declared  smart  enough 
for  military  men.  Norwich  also  wove  stuffs  that  were  in  demand 
for  costly  household  furniture ;  and  Sir  John  Cobham,  in  1394, 
bequeathed  "  a  bed  of  Norwich  stuff  embroidered  with  butterflies." 
In  one  of  the  chapels  at  Durham  priory  there  were  four  blue 
cushions  of  Norwich  work.  Worsted,  a  town  in  Norfolk,  by  a 
new  method  of  its  own  for  the  carding  of  the  wool  with  combs  of 
iron  well  heated,  and  then  twisting  the  thread  harder  than  usual  in 
the  spinning,  enabled  our  weavers  to  produce  a  woollen  stuff  of  a 
peculiar  quality,  to  which  the  name  itself  of  worsted  was  imme- 
diately given.  To  such  a  high  repute  did  the  new  web  grow  that 
church  vestments  and  domestic  furniture  of  the  choicest  sorts  were 
made  out  of  it.    Exeter  cathedral  among  its  chasubles  had  several 

F 


66  ,.J  TEXTILES. 

"  de  iiigro  worsted "  in  cloth  of  gold.  Vestments  made  of  worsted, 
variously  spelt  "worse ft"  and  "woryst,"  are  enumerated  in  the 
"  fabric  rolls  of  York  minster.  Elizabeth  de  Bohun,  in  1356,  be- 
queathed to  her  daughter  the  countess  of  Arundel  "  a  bed  of  red 
worsted  embroidered  ; "  and  Joane  lady  Bergavenny  leaves  to  John 
of  Ormond  "a  bed  of  cloth  of  gold  with  lebardes,  with  those 
cushions  and  tapettes  of  my  best  red  worsted." 

Irish  cloth,  white  and  red,  in  the  reign  of  king  John  was  much 
used  in  England;  and  in  the  household  expenses  of  Swinford, 
bishop  of  Hereford  in  1290,  an  item  occurs  of  Irish  cloth  for 
lining. 

English  weavers  knew  also  how  to  work  artificially  designed 
and  well-figured  webs.  In  the  wardrobe  accounts  of  Edward  the 
second  is  this  item  :  "to  a  mercer  of  London  for  a  green  hanging 
of  wool  wove  with  figures  of  kings  and  earls  upon  it,  for  the  king's 
service  in  his  hall  on  solemn  feasts  at  London."  Such  "  salles," 
as  they  were  called  in  France,  and  "  hullings"  or  rather  "hallings" 
the  name  they  went  under  here,  were  much  valued  abroad  and  in 
common  use  at  home.  Under  the  head  of  "  Salles  d'Angleterre  " 
among  the  articles  of  costly  furniture  belonging  to  Charles  the  fifth 
of  France,  in  1364,  one  set  of  hangings  is  thus  entered:  "une 
salle  d'Angleterre  vermeille  brodee  d'azur,  et  est  la  bordeure  a 
vignettes  et  le  dedens  de  lyons,  d'aigles  et  de  lyepars."  Here  in 
England,  Richard  earl  of  Arundel  in  1392  willed  to  his  dear  wife 
"  the  hangings  of  the  hall  which  was  lately  made  in  London,  of 
blue  tapestry  with  red  roses  with  the  arms  of  my  sons/'  etc. ;  and 
lady  Bergavenny,  after  bequeathing  her  hullying  of  black,  red,  and 
green  to  one  friend,  left  to  another  her  best  stained  "  hall." 

Flemish  textiles,  at  least  of  the  less  ambitious  kinds  such  as 
napery  and  woollens,  were  much  esteemed  centuries  ago ;  and  our 
countryman  Matthew  of  Westminster  says  of  Flanders  that,  made 
from  the  material  which  we  sent  her,  the  wool,  she  sent  us  back 
precious  garments.  So  important  was  the  supply  of  wool  to  the 
Flemings  in  the  fourteenth  century  that  the  check  given  to  it  by 


TEXTILES.  L  If 

the  wars  between  England  and  France  at  that  time  led  to  a  ^eeial 
treaty  between  Edward  the  third  and  the  burghers  of  the  Flench, 
communes  under  the  guidance  of  James  van  Artevelde.  \" 
Though  industrious  everywhere  within  her  limits,  some  of  the 
towns  of  Flanders  stood  foremost  for  certain  kinds  of  stuff,  and 
Bruges  became  in  the  latter  end  of  the  fifteenth  century  conspicuous 
for  its  silken  textiles.  The  satins  of  Bruges  were  used  in  England 
for  church  garments.  Haconbie  church,  in  1566,  had  "one  white 
vestmente  of  bridges  satten  repte  in  peces  and  a  clothe  made 
thereof  to  hange  before  our  pulpitf;"  and  in  1520  York  cathedral 
had  "  a  vestment  of  balkyn  (baudekin)  with  a  crosse  of  green  satten 
in  bryges."  Her  damasks  silks  were  equally  in  demand;  and 
the  specimens  at  South  Kensington  will  interest  the  student. 
Nos.  8318  and  8332  show  the  ability  of  the  Bruges  loom; 
while  the  favourite  pattern  with  the  pomegranate  in  it  betrays 
the  likings  of  the  Spaniards,  at  that  time  the  rulers  of  the  country, 
for  this  token  of  their  renowned  Isabella.  No.  8319  is  another 
sample  of  Flemish  weaving,  rich  in  its  gold  and  full  of  beauty  in 
design. 

In  her  velvets  Flanders  had  no  need  to  fear  a  comparison 
with  anything  of  the  kind  that  Italy  ever  threw  off  from  her 
looms,  whether  at  Venice,  Florence,  or  Genoa.  Not  to  name 
others  one  example,  with  its  cloth  of  gold  ground  and  its  pattern 
in  a  dark  blue  deep-piled  velvet,  is  not  surpassed  in  gorgeousness 
even  by  that  splendid  stuff  from  Florence  of  which  the  Stony- 
hurst  cope,  just  spoken  of,  was  made. 

Block-printed  linen  toward  the  end  of  the  fourteenth  century 
was  another  production  of  Flanders.  Though  existing  examples 
to  the  eyes  of  many  may  look  poor  or  mean,  yet  to  men  like 
the  cotton-printers  of  Lancashire  they  will  have  a  strong  attrac- 
tion ;  and  to  the  scholar  they  will  be  deeply  interesting  as  sug- 
gestive of  the  art  of  printing.  Such  specimens  are  rare,  but  it  is 
likely  that  England  can  show  in  the  chapter  library  at  Durham 
the  earliest  sample  of  the  kind  as  yet  known  ;  a  fine  sheet  wrapped 


68 


TEXTILES. 


about  the  body  of  some  old  bishop  found  in  a  grave  opened  by 
Mr.  Raine  in  1827,  within  the  cathedral.  Several  pieces  of 
ancient  silks  and  English  embroidery  were  found  at  the  same 
time. 

What  Bruges  was  in  silks  and  velvets,  Ypres,  in  the  sixteenth 
century,  became  for  linen ;  and  for  many  years  Flemish  linens 
were  in  favourite  use  throughout  England.  Hardly  a  church 
of  any  size,  scarcely  a  gentleman's  house  in  this  country,  but  used 
a  quantity  of  towels  and  other  napery  that  was  made  in  Flanders, 
especially  at  Ypres. 

French  silks,  now  in  such  extensive  use,  were  not  much  cared 
for  until  the  end  of  the  sixteenth  century  in  France  itself,  and 
seldom  heard  of  abroad.  The  reader,  then,  must  not  be  as- 
tonished at  finding  so  few  examples  of  the  French  loom  in  any 
collection  of  ancient  silken  textiles. 

In  France,  as  in  England,  women  in  mediaeval  days,  old  and 
young,  rich  and  poor,  while  filling  up  their  leisure  hours  in-doors 
used  to  work  on  a  small  loom,  weaving  narrow  webs,  often  of, 
gold  and  diapered  with  coloured  silks.  At  South  Kensington, 
nos.  1250,  7062,  and  7064  are  examples  of  such  French  wrought 
stuffs  belonging  to  the  thirteenth  century.  In  damasks,  the 
earliest  French  productions  are  of  the  sixteenth  century;  and 
no.  8352  is  a  favourable  example  of  what  this  manufacture  then 
was  in  France  \  everything  later  is  of  the  type  so  well  known  to 
everybody.  In  several  of  her  textiles  a  leaning  towards  classicism 
in  design  is  discernible. 

Like  Flanders,  France  knew  how  to  weave  fine  linen  which 
here  in  England  was  much  employed  for  ecclesiastical  as  well 
as  household  purposes.  Three  new  cloths  of  Rains  (Rennes 
in  Brittany)  were,  in  1327,  in  use  for  the  high  altar  in  Exeter 
cathedral,  and  many  altar  cloths  of  Paris  linen.  In  the  poem  of 
the  6  Squire  of  low  degree'  the  lady  is  told 

Your  blankettes  shal  be  of  fustyane, 
Your  shetes  shal  be  of  cloths  of  rayne ; 


TEXTILES. 


69 


and,  in  1434,  la(ty  Bergavenny  devises  in  her  will  "two  pair 
sheets  of  Raynes,  a  pair  of  fustians,"  etc. 

Cologne,  the  queen  of  the  Rhine,  became  famous  during  the 
whole  of  the  fifteenth  and  part  of  the  sixteenth  century  for  a 
certain  kind  of  ecclesiastical  textile  which,  from  the  very  general 
use  to  which  it  has  been  applied,  we  may  call  "  orphrey  web." 
The  productions  of  Cologne,  however,  are  every  way  far  below 
in  beauty  the  similar  works  of  Italy.  Italian  orphrey-webs  are 
generally  worked  in  gold  or  yellow  silk  upon  a  crimson  ground  of 
silk.  Florentine  are  often  distinguished  from  the  Venetian  by 
the  introduction  of  white  for  the  faces;  those  of  Cologne  vary 
from  both  by  introducing  blue,  while  the  material  is  almost  always 
poor  and  the  weaving  coarse.  In  England  this  orphrey  web  was 
in  church  use  and  called,  as  we  learn  from  the  York  "  wills  and 
testaments,"  "  rebayn  de  Colayn." 

The  piece  of  German  napery,  no.  8317  (of  the  beginning  of 
the  fifteenth  century),  will  be  to  those  curious  about  household 
linen  an  acceptable  specimen. 

If  in  some  old  inventory  of  church  vestments  we  find  an  entry 
mentioning  a  chasuble  made  of  cloth  of  Cologne,  we  should 
understand  it  to  mean  not  a  certain  broad  textile  woven  there,  but 
merely  a  vestment  composed  of  several  pieces  of  this  kind  of  web 
sewed  together ;  like  the  frontal  made  of  pieces  of  woven  Venice 
orphreys,  no.  8976. 


CHAPTER  VII. 


The  countries  whence  silks  came  to  England  are  numerous ;  we 
find  early  notices  of  Antioch,  Tarsus,  Alexandria,  Damascus, 
Byzantium,  Cyprus,  Trip  or  Tripoli,  and  Bagdad,  and  later  of 
Venice,  Genoa,  and  Lucca.  To  fix  the  localities  of  others  would 
be  but  guess  work. 

At  the  beginning  of  the  fourteenth  century  a  silk  called 
"  Acca "  is  occasionally  mentioned :  and,  from  the  description, 
it  must  have  been  a  cloth  of  gold  shot  with  coloured  silk,  figured 
with  animals  :  William  de  Clinton,  earl  of  Huntingdon,  gave  to  St. 
Alban's  monastery  a  whole  vestment  of  cloth  of  gold  shot  with 
sky-blue  and  called  cloth  of  Acca.  It  would  look  as  if  this  stuff 
took  its  name  from  having  been  brought  to  us  through  the  port  of 
Acre  :  and  Macri,  in  his  valuable  Hierolexicon,  says  that  the 
name  of  the  ancient  Ptolemais  in  Syria  was  so  written. 

What  in  one  age  and  at  a  particular  place  happened  to  be 
well  made  and  therefore  was  eagerly  sought  for,  at  a  later  period 
and  in  another  place  was  better  wrought  and  at  a  lower  price. 
Time,  indeed,  changed  the  name  of  the  market,  but  did  not  alter 
in  any  great  degree  either  the  quality  of  the  material  or  the  style 
of  the  design  wrought  upon  it.  Throughout  the  kingdom  of  the 
Byzantine  Greeks  the  loom  had  to  change  its  gearing  very  little. 
The  Saracenic  loom,  whether  in  Asia,  Africa,  or  Spain,  was 
always  Arabic,  though  Persia  could  not  forget  her  old  traditions 
about  the  "horn"  or  tree  of  life,  and  cheetahs,  and  birds  of 


TEXTILES,  71 

various  sorts.  With  regard  to  the  whole  of  Asia,  its  many 
peoples  from  the  earliest  ages  knew  how  not  only  to  weave  cloth 
of  gold  but  to  figure  it  with  birds  and  beasts.  In  later  times, 
Marco  Polo  in  the  thirteenth  century  found  exactly  the  same 
kinds  of  textile  known  in  the  days  of  Darius  still  everywhere, 
from  the  shores  of  the  Mediterranean  to  the  far  east.  What  he 
says  of  Bagdad  he  repeats  in  fewer  words  about  many  other 
cities.  In  finding  their  way  to  England  these  fabrics  received,  if 
not  in  all  at  least  in  most  instances,  the  names  of  the  seaports  in 
the  Mediterranean  where  they  had  been  shipped. 

For  beautifully  wrought  and  figured  silk,  one  of  the  few  terms 
that  still  outlive  the  mediaeval  period  is  Damask. 

China,  no  doubt,  was  the  first  country  to  ornament  its  silken 
webs  with  a  pattern.  India,  Persia,  and  Syria,  then  Byzantine 
Greece,  followed,  but  at  long  intervals  between,  in  China's  foot- 
steps. Stuffs  so  figured  brought  with  them  to  the  west  the  name 
"  diaspron "  or  diaper,  bestowed  upon  them  at  Constantinople. 
But  about  the  twelfth  century  the  city  of  Damascus,  even  then 
long  celebrated  for  its  looms,  so  far  outstripped  all  other  places 
for  beauty  of  design  that  her  silken  textiles  were  in  demand  every- 
where; and  thus,  as  often  happens,  traders  fastened  the  name 
of  Damascen  or  Damask  upon  every  silken  fabric  richly  wrought 
and  curiously  designed,  no  matter  whether  it  came  or  not  from 
Damascus.  At  last,  samit,  having  long  been  the  epithet  be- 
tokening all  that  was  rich  and  good  in  silk,  was  forgotten,  and 
diaper,  from  being  the  very  word  significant  of  pattern,  became 
a  secondary  term  descriptive  of  merely  a  part  in  the  elaborate 
design  on  damask. 

Baudekin,  that  sort  of  costly  cloth  of  gold  spoken  of  so  much 
during  so  many  years  in  English  literature,  took  (as  was  said  1 
before)  its  famous  name  from  Bagdad.  Many  specimens  of  bau- 
dekin in  the  South  Kensington  collection  furnish  proofs  of  the 
ancient  weavers'  dexterity  in  their  management  of  the  loom,  and 
especially  of  the  artists'  taste  in  setting  out  their  intricate  and 


72 


TEXTILES, 


beautiful  designs.  An  identification  between  very  many  samples 
there  brought  together  of  ancient  textiles  in  silk  and  the  descrip- 
tions of  similar  stuffs  given  us  in  those  valuable  records,  our  old 
church  inventories,  might  be  carried  on  if  necessary  to  a  very 
lengthened  extent. 

Dorneck  was  the  name  given  to  an  inferior  kind  of  damask 
wrought  of  silk,  wool,  linen  thread  and  gold,  in  Flanders.  This 
was  manufactured  towards  the  end  of  the  fifteenth  century  mostly 
at  Tournay ;  which  city  in  Flemish  was  often  called  Dorneck — a 
word  variously  spelt  as  Darnec,  Darnak,  Darnick,  and  sometimes 
even  Darness. 

The  guild  of  the  blessed  Virgin  at  Boston  had  a  care  cloth  of 
"  silke  dornex  "  and  church  furniture.  The  "  care  cloth  "  was  a 
sort  of  canopy  held  over  the  bride  and  bridegroom  as  they  knelt 
for  the  nuptial  blessing,  according  to  the  Salisbury  rite,  at  the 
marriage  mass.  At  Exeter  dorneck  was  used  in  chasubles  for 
orphreys.  A  specimen  of  dorneck  may  be  seen,  no.  7058.  It  is 
several  times  mentioned  in  the  York  fabric  rolls. 

Buckram,  so  called  from  Bokkara  where  it  was  originally 
made,  in  the  middle  ages  was  much  esteemed  for  being  costly  and 
very  fine ;  and  consequently  fit  for  use  in  church  vestments  and  for 
secular  personal  wear.  "  Panus  Tartaricus  "  or  Tartary  cloth  is 
often  spoken  of.  John  Grandison,  bishop  of  Exeter  in  1327, 
gave  to  his  cathedral  flags  of  white  and  red  buckram ;  and  among 
the  five  very  rich  veils  for  covering  the  moveable  lectern  in  that 
church  three  were  lined  with  blue  "bokeram."  As  late  as  the 
beginning  of  the  sixteenth  century  this  stuff  was  held  good  enough 
for  lining  to  a  black  velvet  gown  for  a  queen,  Elizabeth  of  York. 
The  coarse  thick  fabric  which  now  goes  by  the  name  is  very 
different  from  the  older  production  known  as  "  bokeram. " 

Burdalisaunder,  Bordalisaunder,  Bourde  de  Elisandre,  with 
other  varieties  in  spelling,  is  a  term  often  to  be  met  with  in  old 
wills  and  church  inventories.  In  the  year  1327  Exeter  had  a 
chasuble  of  Bourde  de  Elisandre  of  divers  colours  :  and  from  the 


TEXTILES. 


73 


Yorkshire  wills  we  find  that  sometimes  it  was  wide  enough  for 
half  a  piece  to  form  the  adornment  of  a  high  altar. 

"  Bord"  in  Arabic  means  a  striped  cloth;  and  we  know,  both 
from  travellers  and  the  importation  of  the  textile  itself,  that  many 
tribes  in  north  and  eastern  Africa  weave  stuffs  for  personal  wear 
of  a  pattern  consisting  of  white  and  black  longitudinal  stripes. 
St.  Augustin,  living  in  north  Africa  near  the  modern  Algiers, 
speaks  of  a  stuff  for  clothing  called  "  burda "  in  the  end  of  the 
fourth  and  beginning  of  the  fifth  century.  It  is  not  impossible 
that  the  curtains  for  the  tabernacle  as  well  as  the  girdles  for  Aaron 
and  his  sons,  of  fine  linen  and  violet  and  purple  and  scarlet  twice 
dyed,  were  wrought  with  this  very  pattern,  so  that  in  the  "  burd 
Alisaunder"  we  behold  the  oldest  known  design  for  any  textile. 
This  stuff  in  the  middle  ages  was  a  silken  web  in  different  coloured 
stripes,  and  specimens  also  may  be  found  at  South  Kensington. 
Though  made  in  many  places  round  the  Mediterranean  this  silk 
took  its  name,  at  least  in  England,  from  Alexandria. 

Fustian,  of  which  we  still  have  two  forms  in  velveteen  and 
corduroy,  was  originally  wove  at  Fustat  on  the  Nile,  with  a  warp 
of  linen  thread  and  a  woof  of  thick  cotton,  so  twilled  and  cut  that 
it  showed  on  one  side  a  thick  but  low  pile ;  and  the  web  thus 
managed  took  its  name  of  Fustian  from  that  Egyptian  city.  At 
what  period  it  was  invented  we  do  not  rightly  know,  but  we  are 
well  aware  it  must  have  been  brought  very  early  to  this  country ; 
for  our  countryman  St.  Stephen  Harding,  when  a  Cistercian 
abbot  and  an  old  man  about  the  year  1114,  forbade  chasubles  in 
his  church  to  be  made  of  anything  but  fustian  or  plain  linen. 
The  austerity  of  his  rule  reached  even  the  ornaments  of  the 
church.  From  such  a  prohibition  we  are  not  to  draw  as  a  con- 
clusion that  fustian  was  at  the  time  a  mean  material ;  quite  the 
contrary,  although  not  splendid  it  was  a  seemly  textile.  Years 
afterwards,  in  the  fourteenth  century,  Chaucer  tells  us  of  his 
knight : — 

Of  fustian  he  wered  a  gepon. 


74 


TEXTILES. 


In  the  fifteenth  century  Naples  had  a  repute  for  weaving 
fustians ;  and  our  English  churchwardens,  not  being  learned  in 
geography  or  spelling,  made  some  odd  mistakes  in  their  ac- 
counts about  this  as  about  some  other  continental  stuffs  :  "  Fus- 
chan  in  appules  "  for  fustian  from  Naples  is  droll;  yet  droller 
still  is  "  mustyrd  devells,"  for  a  cloth  made  in  France  at  a  town 
called  Mustrevilliers. 

Muslin,  as  it  is  now  throughout  the  world  so  from  the  earliest 
antiquity,  has  been  everywhere  in  Asia  in  favourite  use  both  as  an 
article  of  dress  and  as  furniture.  Its  cloud-like  thinness  and  its 
lightness  were  not  the  only  charms  belonging  to  this  stuff :  it  was 
esteemed  equally  as  much  for  the  taste  with  which  stripes  of  gold 
had  been  woven  in  its  warp.  As  we  learn  from  the  travels  of 
Marco  Polo,  the  further  all  wayfarers  in  Asia  wandered  among 
eastern  nations  the  higher  they  found  the  point  of  excellence 
which  had  been  reached  in  weaving  silk  and  gold  into  splendid 
fabrics.  The  silkworm  lived  and  thrived  there  and  the  cotton 
plant  also  was  in  its  home,  its  birth-place,  in  those  regions. 

Like  many  cities  of  central  Asia,  Mosul  had  earned  for  itself  a 
reputation  of  old  for  the  beauty  of  its  gold-wrought  silken  textiles. 
Cotton  grew  all  around  in  plenty ;  the  inhabitants,  especially  the 
women,  were  gifted  with  such  quick  feeling  of  finger  that  they 
could  spin  thread  from  this  cotton  of  more  than  hair-like  fineness. 
Cotton  with  them  took  the  place  of  silk  in  the  loom ;  and  gold 
was  not  forgotten  in  the  weaving.  Their  work,  not  only  because 
it  was  so  much  cheaper  but  from  its  own  peculiar  beauty  and 
comeliness,  won  for  itself  a  high  place  in  common  estimation  :  and 
the  name  of  the  town  where  it  was  wrought  in  such  perfection  was 
given  to  it  as  its  distinctive  name.  Hence,  whether  wove  with  or 
without  gold,  we  call  this  cotton  web  muslin,  from  the  Asiatic  city 
of  Mosul. 

Cloth  of  Areste  is  another  term  for  woven  stuffs,  to  be  found 
in  our  old  English  deeds  and  inventories.  The  first  time  we 
meet  it  is  in  an  order  given,  1244,  by  Henry  the  third  for  finding 


TEXTILES. 


75 


two  cloths  of  Areste  with  which  two  copes  were  to  be  made  for 
royal  chapels.  Again  it  comes  a  few  years  later  at  St.  Paul's, 
which  cathedral  a.d.  1295  had,  besides  a  dalmatic  and  tunicle 
of  this  silk  "  white  silk  of  Areste  diapered,"  as  many  as  thirty  and 
more  hangings  of  the  same  texture. 

From  the  description  of  these  pieces  we  gather  that  this  so- 
called  cloth  of  Areste  must  have  been  both  beautiful  and  rich, 
being  for  the  most  part  cloth  of  gold  figured  elaborately ;  some 
with  lions  and  double-headed  eagles,  others,  for  example,  with  the 
death  and  burial  of  our  Lord. 

We  are  not  disposed  to  agree  with  the  suggestion  that  this 
cloth  was  a  kind  of  arras.  Arras  had  not  won  for  itself  a  reputa- 
tion for  its  tapestry  before  the  fourteenth  century.  Tapestry 
itself  is  too  thick  and  heavy  for  use  in  vestments ;  yet  this  cloth  of 
Areste  wTas  light  enough  for  tunicles,  and  when  worn  out  was 
sometimes  condemned  at  St.  Paul's  to  be  put  aside  for  lining 
other  ritual  garments.  Among  the  three  meanings  for  the  me- 
diaeval "  Aresta  "  one  is  any  kind  of  covering.  It  seems,  there- 
fore, probable  that  these  cloths  of  Areste  took  their  name  not 
from  the  place  where  they  had  been  woven,  but  from  the  use  to 
which  they  were  generally  put ;  namely,  for  hangings  about 
churches.  Moreover,  tapestry  or  Arras  work,  being  thick  and 
heavy,  could  never  have  been  employed  for  such  light  use  as  that 
of  apparels  nor  would  it  have  been  diapered  like  silk,  yet  we  find 
"  Areste  "  to  have  been  so  fashioned  and  so  used. 

Silks  also  were  distinguished  through  their  colours  and  shades 
of  colours  :  and  the  men  who  drew  up  the  mediaeval  inventories 
seem  to  have  been  gifted  with  a  keen  eye  for  varieties  of  shades 
and  tints.  For  instance,  a  chasuble  at  St.  Paul's  is  set  down,  late 
in  the  thirteenth  century,  as  made  of  samit  dyed  in  a  purple 
somewhat  bordering  on  a  blood-red  tone.  Tarsus  colour  is  often 
mentioned :  and  it  was,  probably,  some  shade  of  purple.  The 
people  of  Tarsus  no  doubt  got  from  their  murex,  a  shell-fish  of  the 
class  mollusca  and  purpurifera  family  to  be  found  on  their  coast, 


76  TEXTILES. 

their/ dyeing  matter;  and  when  we  remember  what  changes  are 
wrought  in  the  animal  itself  by  the  food  it  eats,  and  what  strong 
effects  are  made  by  slight  variations  in  climate,  even  atmosphere, 
upon  materials  for  colouring  in  the  moment  of  application,  we 
may  easily  understand  how  the  difference  arose  between  the  two 
tints  of  purple. 

"  Cloth  of  Tarsus  "  itself  was  of  a  rare  and  costly  kind,  of  fine 
goats'  hair  and  silk.  The  tint  was  some  shade  of  royal  purple. 
Chaucer  tells  us  that 

The  great  Emetrius,  the  king  of  Inde, 
Upon  a  stede  bay,  trapped  in  stele, 
Covered  with  cloth  of  gold  diapred  wele, 
Came  riding  like  the  god  of  armes  Mars. 
His  cote  armure  was  of  a  cloth  of  Tars, 
Couched  with  pedes,  etc. 

Other  cities  besides  Tarsus  gave  their  names  to  various  shades 
of  purple  ;  according  as  they  were  dyed  at  Antioch,  Alexandria, 
or  Naples.  Each  place  had  a  particular  shade  which  distin- 
guished it  from  the  others.  It  is  not  now  possible  to  ascertain 
what  were  the  exact  distinctions  of  tint.  Sky-blue  was  a  colour 
everywhere  in  church  use  for  certain  festivals  throughout  England. 
In  the  early  inventories  the  name  for  that  tint  is  "Indicus," 
"  Indus,"  reminding  us  of  our  present  indigo.  In  later  lists  it  is 
called  "  Blodius,"  not  sanguinary  but  blue.  Murrey,  or  a  reddish 
brown,  is  also  often  specified. 

Silks  woven  of  two  colours,  so  that  one  of  them  showed  itself 
unmixed  and  quite  distinct  on  one  side,  and  the  second  appeared 
equally  clear  on  the  other — a  thing  sometimes  now  looked  upon 
as  a  wonder  in  modern  weaving — might  occasionally  be  met  with 
here  at  the  mediaeval  period  :  Exeter  cathedral  had,  in  1327,  a  silk 
cloth  "of  red  colour  inside  and  yellow  outside."  At  York,  in 
1543,  there  was  "  a  vestment  of  changeable  silke,"  "besides  one 
of  changeable  taffety  for  Good  Friday." 

Marble  silk  had  a  weft  of  several  colours  so  woven  as  to  make 


TEXTILES.  ?r  *f> 

the  whole  web  look  like  marble,  stained  with  a  variety  of^t|nts. 
There  were  many  such  vestments  in  old  St.  Paul's.  Durin^ru^, 
three  centuries  this  marble  silk  found  great  favour  among  us ;  for; 
Henry  Machyn,  in  his  curious  diary,  tells  us  how  "  the  old  qwyne 
of  Schottes  rod  thrught  London/'  and  how  "  then  cam  the  lord 
tresorer  with  a  C.  gret  horsse  and  ther  cotes  of  marbull,"  etc.,  to 
meet  her  the  6th  of  November,  155 1: 


CHAPTER  VIII. 


We  must  now  speak  of  embroidery.  The  art  of  working  with  the 
needle  flowers,  fruits,  human  and  animal  forms,  or  any  fanciful 
design,  upon  webs  woven  of  silk,  linen,  cotton,  wool,  hemp,  be- 
sides other  kinds  of  stuff,  is  of  the  highest  antiquity. 

Those  patterns,  after  so  many  fashions,  which  we  see  figured 
upon  the  garments  worn  by  men  and  women  on  Egyptian  and 
Assyrian  monuments,  but  especially  on  the  burned-clay  vases 
made  and  painted  by  the  Greeks  in  their  earliest  as  well  as 
in  later  times,  or  which  we  read  about  in  the  writings  of  that 
people,  were  not  wrought  in  the  loom,  but  worked  by  the  needle. 

The  old  Egyptian  loom — and  that  of  the  Jews  must  have  been 
like  it — was,  as  we  know  from  paintings,  of  the  simplest  shape, 
and  seems  to  have  been  able  to  do  little  more  diversified  in 
design  than  straight  lines  in  different  colours  ;  and  at  best  nothing 
higher  in  execution  than  checker-work :  beyond  this,  all  was  put 
in  by  hand  with  the  needle.  In  Paris,  at  the  Louvre,  are  several 
pieces  of  early  Egyptian  webs  coloured,  drawings  of  which  have 
been  published  by  Sir  Gardner  Wilkinson  in  his  work  'The 
Egyptians  in  the  time  of  the  Pharaohs.'  There  are  two  pieces 
wrought  up  and  down  with  needlework ;  the  second  piece  of  blue 
is  figured  all  over  in  white  embroidery  with  a  pattern  of  netting, 
the  meshes  of  which  shut  in  irregular  cubic  shapes,  and  in  the 
lines  of  the  reticulation  the  mystic  "fylfot"  is  seen.  Sir  J.  G. 
Wilkinson  says  of  them :  "  They  are  mostly  cotton,  and,  though 


TEXTILES. 


79 


their  date  is  uncertain,  they  suffice  to  show  that  the  manufacture 
was  Egyptian  ;  and  the  many  dresses  painted  on  the  monuments 
of  the  eighteenth  dynasty  show  that  the  most  varied  patterns 
were  used  by  the  Egyptians  more  than  3000  years  ago,  as  they 
were  at  a  later  period  by  the  Babylonians,  who  became  noted  for 
their  needlework. " 

It  is  clear  from  the  book  of  Exodus  that  the  Israelites  from 
very  early  times,  having  learnt  the  art  in  Egypt,  embroidered  their 
garments;  although  the  word  " embroidery "  which  occurs  so 
frequently  in  every  English  version  probably  sometimes  means 
merely  weaving  in  stripes,  and  not  work  with  the  needle.  The 
embroidering  also  of  the  sails  of  vessels  was  not  uncommon  in  the 
east  3  boats  used  in  sacred  festivals  on  the  Nile  were  so  decorated ; 
and  the  prophet  Ezekiel  says  to  the  people  of  Tyre,  "  Fine  linen 
with  broidered  work  from  Egypt,  was  that  which  thou  spreadest 
forth  to  be  thy  sail."  The  reader  will  here  also  remember  Shaks- 
peare's  description  of  the  barge  of  Cleopatra ; 

The  barge  she  sat  in,  like  a  burnished  throne 

Burned  on  the  water  : 

Purple  the  sails,  and  so  perfumed,  that 

The  winds  were  love-sick  with  them ;  she  did  lie 

In  her  pavilion,  cloth  of  gold,  of  tissue,  etc. 

Pliny  says  that  the  Phrygians  invented  embroidery,  and  that 
garments  so  ornamented  were  called  Phrygionic.  Of  such  a  fashion 
were  "  the  art-wrought  vests  of  splendid  purple  tint "  brought 
forth  by  Dido,  and  the  cloak  given  by  Andromache  to  Ascanius. 
Hence,  an  embroiderer  was  called  in  Latin  "  Phrygio,"  and 
needlework  "  Phrygium  "  or  "  Phrygian"  work.  When  the  design, 
as  often  happened,  was  wrought  in  solid  gold  wire  or  golden 
thread,  the  embroidery  so  worked  was  named  "  auriphrygium." 
From  this  term  comes  the  old  English  word  "  orphrey." 

While  Phrygia  in  general,  Babylon  in  particular  (as  Pliny  also 
tells  us)  became  celebrated  for  the  beauty  of  its  embroideries. 
All  who  have  seen  the  sculptures  in  the  British  museum  brought 


So 


TEXTILES. 


from  Nineveh,  and  described  and  figured  by  Layard,  must  have 
remarked  how  lavishly  the  Assyrians  adorned  their  rober  with  the 
needlework  for  which  one  of  their  greatest  cities  was  so  famous. 
Up  to  the  first  century  of  our  era  the  reputation  which  Babylon 
had  won  for  her  textiles  and  needlework  still  lived.  We  know 
from  Josephus,  who  had  often  been  to  worship  at  Jerusalem,  that 
the  veils  of  the  Temple  were  Babylonian ;  and  of  the  outer  one 
that  writer  says :  "  there  was  a  veil  of  equal  largeness  with  the 
door.  It  was  a  Babylonian  curtain,  embroidered  with  blue  and 
fine  linen,  and  scarlet  and  purple,  and  of  a  texture  that  was 
wonderful." 

What  the  Jews  did  for  the  Temple  we  may  be  sure  was  done 
by  Christians  for  the  Church.  The  faithful,  however,  went  even 
further,  and  wore  garments  figured  all  over  with  sacred  subjects 
in  embroidery.  We  learn  this  from  a  stirring  sermon  preached  by 
St.  Asterius,  bishop  of  Amasia  in  Pontus,  in  the  fourth  century. 
Taking  for  his  text  "  a  certain  rich  man  who  was  clothed  in 
purple  and  fine  linen"  he  upbraids  the  world  for  its  follies  in  dress, 
and  complains  that  some  people  went  about  arrayed  like  painted 
walls,  with  beasts  and  flowers  all  over  them ;  while  others,  pre- 
tending a  more  serious  tone  of  thought,  dressed  in  clothes  de- 
picting the  doings  and  wonders  of  our  Lord.  "Strive,"  St. 
Asterius  exhorts  them,  "to  follow  in  your  lives  the  teachings  of 
the  Gospel,  rather  than  have  the  miracles  of  our  Redeemer  em- 
broidered upon  your  outward  dress."  To  have  had  so  many 
subjects  shown  upon  one  garment  it  is  clear  that  each  must  have 
been  done  very  small,  and  wrought  in  outline ;  a  style  which  is 
being  brought  back,  with  great  effect,  into  modern  ecclesiastical 
use. 

The  discriminating  accuracy  with  which  our  old  writers  noted  ■ 
the  several  kinds  of  textile  gifts  bestowed  upon  a  church  is  as 
instructive  as  praiseworthy.    Ingulph  did  not  think  it  enough  to 
say  that  abbot  Egelric  had  given  many  hangings  to  the  church  at 
Croyland,  the  great  number  of  which  were  silken,  but  he  explains 


TEXTILES. 


81 


also  that  some  were  ornamented  with  birds  wrought  in  gold  and 
sewed  on  ;  in  fact,  of  cut-work ;  others  with  those  birds  woven 
into  the  stuff ;  others  quite  plain.  We  find  the  same  care  taken 
in  old  inventories. 

By  the  latter  end  of  the  thirteenth  century  embroidery  ob- 
tained for  its  several  styles  and  various  sorts  of  ornamentation  a 
distinguishing  and  technical  nomenclature.  One  of  the  earliest 
documents  in  which  we  meet  with  this  set  of  terms  is  the  in- 
ventory drawn  up,  in  1295,  of  the  vestments  belonging  to  St. 
Paul's  cathedral,  printed  by  Dugdale  :  herein,  the  "opus  plu- 
marium,"  the  "  opus  pectineum,"  the  "  opus  pulvinarium,"  "  con- 
sutum  de  serico,"  "  de  serico  consul,'*  may  be  severally  found. 

"Opus  plumarium"  was  the  then  usual  term  for  what  is  now 
commonly  called  embroidery;  and  was  given  to  needlework  01 
this  kind  because  the  stitches  were  laid  down  longwise  and  not 
across  :  that  is,  so  put  together  that  they  seemed  to  overlap  one 
another  like  the  feathers  in  the  plumage  of  a  bird.  This  style 
was  aptly  called  "feather-stitch"  work,  in  contradistinction  to 
that  done  in  cross  and  tent  stitch,  or  the  "  cushion-style." 

The  "  opus  pulvinarium,"  or  "  cushion-style,"  was  like  the 
modern  so-called  Berlin  work.  As  now,  so  then  it  was  done  in 
the  same  stitching  with  pretty  much  the  same  materials  and 
generally,  if  not  always,  put  to  the  same  purpose ;  for  cushions,  to 
sit  or  to  kneel  upon  in  church  or  to  uphold  the  mass-book  at  the 
altar;  hence  its  name  of  "cushion-style."  In  working  it  silken 
thread  is  known  to  have  been  often  used.  Among  other  speci- 
mens, and  in  silk,  there  is  a  beautiful  cushion  of  a  date  corre- 
sponding to  the  London  inventory  at  South  Kensington,  no. 
1324.  Being  well  adapted  for  working  heraldry  this  stitch  has 
been  used  from  an  early  period  for  the  purpose  ;  and  emblazoned 
orphreys,  like  the  narrow  hem  on  the  Syon  cope,  were  wrought 
in  it. 

The  "  opus  pectineum  "  was  a  kind  of  woven  work  imitative 
of  embroidery,  and  employed  to  supply  it.    John  Garland,  in  his 

G 


S2  TEXTILES. 

dictionary,  explains  that  it  was  made  by  means  of  a  comb,  or 
spnie-'  comb-like  instrument :  and  from  this  the  work  itself  re- 
ceived the  distinctive  appellation  of  "  pectineum,"  or  comb- 
wrought.  Before  John  Garland  left  England  for  France,  to  teach 
a  school  there,  he  must  have  often  seen  his  countrywomen  at 
such  an  occupation ;  and  the  amice  given  by  Katherine  Lovell  to 
St.  Paul's,  de  opere  pectineo,"  may  perhaps  have  been  the 
work  of  her  own  hands. 

Women  in  the  middle  ages  were  so  ready  at  the  needle  that 
they  could  make  their  embroidery  look  as  if  it  had  been  done  in 
the  loom,  really  woven.  A  shred  of  crimson  cendal  figured  in 
gold  and  silver  thread  with  a  knight  on  horseback,  armed  as  of 
the  latter  time  of  Edward  the  first,  was  shown  to  us  some  time 
ago.  At  first  sight  the  mounted  warrior  seemed  to  have  been 
not  hand-worked  but  woven ;  so  flat,  so  even  was  every  thread. 
Looking  at  it  however  through  a  glass  and  turning  it  about,  we 
found  it  to  have  been  embroidered  by  the  finger  in  such  a  way  that 
the  stitches  laid  down  upon  the  surface  were  carried  through  into 
the  canvas  lining  at  the  back  of  the  thin  silk.  In  this  same 
manner  all  the  design,  both  before  and  behind,  upon  the  fine 
English-wrought  chasuble  at  South  Kensington,  no.  673,  was 
probably  worked. 

At  the  latter  end  of  the  thirteenth  century  our  countrywomen 
invented  a  new  way  of  embroidery.  Without  giving  up  altogether 
the  old  "  opus  plumarium"  or  feather-stitch,  they  mixed  it  with  a 
new  style,  both  of  needlework  and  mechanism.  So  beautiful  was 
the  novel  method  deemed  abroad  that  it  won  for  itself  the  com- 
plimentary appellation  of  "  opus  Anglicum,"  or  English  work. 
In  what  its  peculiarity  consisted  has  long  been  a  question  and  a 
puzzle  among  foreign  archaeological  writers  ;  and  a  living  one  of 
eminence,  M.  Voisin,  noticing  a  cope  of  English  work  given  to 
the  church  of  Tournai,  says  :  "  II  serait  curieux  de  savoir  quelle 
broderie  ou  quel  tissu  on  designait  sous  le  nom  de  opus  An- 
qlicum" 


TEXTILES. 


But  if  we  examine  that  very  fine  piece  of  English  neoffl^brt%V 
the  Syon  cope,  at  South  Kensington,  no.  9182,  we  find  rn^lg^e^ 
first  stitches  for  the  human  face  were  begun  in  the  centre  of  the 
cheek,  and  worked  in  circular  lines ;  falling  (after  the  further  side 
had  been  made)  into  straight  lines,  which  were  so  carried  on 
through  the  rest  of  the  fleshes ;  in  some  instances,  also,  through 
the  draperies.  But  this  was  done  in  a  sort  of  chain-stitch,  and  a 
newly  practised  mechanical  appliance  was  brought  into  use. 
After  the  whole  figure  had  thus  been  wrought  with  this  kind 
of  chain-stitch  in  circles  and  straight  lines,  then  with  a  little  thin 
iron  rod  ending  in  a  small  bulb  or  smooth  knob  slightly  heated, 
those  middle  spots  in  the  faces  that  had  been  worked  in  circular 
lines  were  pressed  down  ;  and  the  deep  wide  dimples  in  the  throat, 
especially  of  aged  persons.  By  the  hollows  thus  lastingly  sunk 
a  play  of  light  and  shadow  is  brought  out,  which  at  a  short  dis- 
tance lends  to  the  portion  so  treated  the  appearance  of  low'  relief. 
Chain-stitch,  then,  worked  in  circular  lines  and  relief  given  to 
parts  by  hollows  sunk  into  the  faces  and  other  portions  of  the 
persons,  constitute  the  elements  of  the  "  opus  Anglicum,"  or 
embroidery  after  the  English  manner.  How  the  chain-stitch  was 
worked  into  circles  for  the  faces,  and  straight  lines  for  the  rest  of 
the  figures,  is  well  shown  by  a  woodcut,  after  a  portion  of  the 
Steeple  Aston  embroideries,  given  in  the  archaeological  journal, 
vol  iv.  p.  285. 

Although  not  merely  the  faces  and  the  extremities  but  the 
dresses  also  of  the  persons  figured  were  generally  wrought  in 
chain-stitch,  and  afterwards  treated  as  we  have  just  described, 
another  practice  was  to  work  the  draperies  in  feather-stitch,  which 
was  also  employed  for  the  grounding,  and  diapered  after  a  simple, 
zigzag  design ;  as  we  find  in  the  Syon  cope. 

How  highly  English  embroideries  were  at  one  period  ap- 
preciated by  foreigners  may  be  gathered  from  the  especial  notice 
taken  of  them  abroad  \  as  we  may  find  in  continental  documents. 
Matilda,  queen  of  William  the  conqueror,  carried  away  from  the 

G  2 


84 


TEXTILES 


Part  of  the  orphrey  of  the  Syon  cope. 


abbey  of  Abingdon  its  richest  vestments,  and  would  not  be  put 
off  with  inferior  ones.  In  his  will  a.  d.  1360  cardinal  Talairand, 
bishop  of  Albano,  speaks  of  the  English  embroideries  on  a 


TEXTILES. 


85 


costly  set  of  white  vestments.  A  bishop  of  Tournai,  in  1343, 
bequeathed  to  that  cathedral  an  old  English  cope,  as  well 
as  a  beautiful  corporal  "  of  English  work."  Among  the 
copes  reserved  for  prelates'  use  in  the  chapel  of  Charles  duke 
of  Bourgogne,  brother-in-law  to  John  duke  of  Bedford,  there  was 
one  of  English  work  very  elaborately  fraught  with  many  figures, 
as  appears  from  this  description  of  it :  "  une  chappe  de  brodeure 
d'or,  facon  d'Engleterre,  a  plusieurs  histoires  de  N.D.  et  anges  et 
autres  ymages,  estans  en  laceures  escriptes,  garnie  d'un  orfroir 
d'icelle  fa9on  fait  a  apostres,  desquelles  les  manteulx  sont  tous 
couves  de  perles,  et  leur  diadesmes  pourphiler  de  perles,  estans 
en  maniere  de  tabernacles,  faits  de  deux  arbres,  dont  les  tiges  sont 
touts  couvertes  de  perles,  et  a  la  dite  chappe  y  a  une  bille  des 
dites  armes,  garnie  de  perles  comme  la  dessus  dicte." 

While  so  coveted  abroad,  our  English  embroidery  was  highly 
prized  and  well  paid  for  at  home.  We  find  in  the  Issue  Rolls 
that  Henry  the  third  had  a  chasuble  embroidered  by  Mabilia  of 
Bury  St.  Edmund's ;  and  that  Edward  the  second  paid  a  hundred 
marks  to  Rose  the  wife  of  John  de  Bureforcl,  a  citizen  and  mercer 
of  London,  for  a  choir-cope  of  her  embroidering,  and  which  was 
to  be  sent  to  the  Pope  as  an  offering  from  the  queen. 

English  embroidery  afterwards  lost  its  first  high  reputation. 
Through  those  years  wasted  with  the  wars  of  the  Roses  the  work 
of  the  English  needle  was  very  poor,  very  coarse,  and,  so  to  say, 
ragged;  as,  for  instance,  the  chasuble  at  South  Kensington, 
no.  4045.  Nothing  of  the  celebrated  chain-stitch  with  dimpled 
faces  in  the  figures  can  be  found  about  it :  every  part  is  worked  in 
the  feather-stitch,  slovenly  put  down.  During  the  early  part  of 
the  seventeenth  century  our  embroiderers  again  struck  out  a  new 
style,  which  consisted  in  throwing  up  the  figures  a  good  height 
above  the  grounding.  Of  this  raised  work  there  is  a  fine  specimen 
in  the  fourth  of  the  copes  preserved  in  the  chapter  liLrary  at 
Durham.  It  is  said  to  have  been  wrought  for  and  given  by 
Charles  the  first  to  that  cathedral.    This  red  silk  vestment  is  well 


85 


TEXTILES. 


spriiiKled  with  bodiless  cherubic  heads  crowned  with  rays  and 
borne  up  by  wings  ;  while  upon  the  hood  is  David,  holding  in  one 
hand  the  head  of  Goliah  ;  the  whole  done  in  highly  raised  em- 
broidery. Bibles  of  the  large  folio  size,  covered  in  rich  silk  or 
satin  and  embroidered  with  the  royal  arms  done  in  bold  raised- 
work,  are  still  to  be  found  in  our  libraries.  More  than  one  of 
these  volumes  is  said  to  have  been  a  gift  from  the  king  to  a  fore- 
father of  the  present  owner. 

This  style  of  raised  embroidery  remained  in  use  for  many  years. 
Not  only  large  Bibles  but  smaller  volumes,  especially  prayer- 
books,  had  bindings  enriched  with  it.  Generally  such  examples 
are  attributed,  and  in  most  cases  wrongly,  to  the  so-called  nuns  of 
Little  Gidding.  The  same  kind  of  work  is  sometimes  found  on 
the  broad  frames  of  old  looking-glasses  :  setting  forth  perhaps,  as 
in  the  specimen  no.  892,  the  story  of  Ahasuerus  and  Esther,  or 
a  passage  in  some  courtship  carried  on  after  the  manners  of 
Arcadia. 

Few  people  at  the  present  day  have  a  just  idea  of  the  labour,, 
the  money,  and  the  length  of  time  often  bestowed  of  old  upon 
embroideries,  which  had  been  sketched  as  well  as  wrought  by  the 
hands  of  men,  each  in  his  own  craft  the  ablest  and  most  cunning 
of  his  time.  In  behalf  of  England  plenty  of  evidence  has  been 
produced  already :  as  a  proof  of  the  same  labour  elsewhere  a 
remarkable  passage  may  be  quoted,  given,  in  his  life  of  Antonio 
Pollaiuolo,  by  Vasari :  "  For  San  Giovanni  in  Florence  there  were 
made  certain  very  rich  vestments  after  the  design  of  this  master, 
all  of  gold-wove  velvet  with  pile  upon  pile  (di  broccato  riccio- 
sopra  riccio),  each  woven  of  one  entire  piece  and  without  seam, 
embroidered  with  the  most  subtile  mastery  of  that  art  by  Paolo  da 
Verona,  a  man  most  eminent  of  his  calling,  and  of  incomparable 
ingenuity.  This  work  took  twenty-six  years  for  its  completion, 
being  wholly  in  close  stitch  (questi  ricami  fatti  con  punto  serrato) 
but  the  excellent  method  of  which  is  now  all  but  lost,  the  custom 
being  in  these  days  to  make  the  stitches  much  wider  (il  puntcg- 


TEXTILES. 


37 


giare  piu  largo),  whereby  the  work  is  rendered  less  durable  and 
much  less  pleasing  to  the  eye."  These  vestments  may  yet  be  seen 
framed  and  glazed  in  presses  around  the  sacristy  of  San  Giovanni. 
Antonio  died  in  1498.  The  magnificent  cope  before  referred  to, 
now  at  Stonyhurst,  is  of  one  seamless  piece  of  gorgeous  gold  tissue 
figured  with  bold  wide-spreading  foliage  in  crimson  velvet,  pile 
upon  pile,  and  dotted  with  small  gold  spots ;  probably  it  came 
from  the  same  loom  that  threw  off  these  famous  San  Giovanni 
vestments. 


Embroidered  Saddle-cloth  of  the  sixteenth  century. 


CHAPTER  IX. 


The  old  English  "opus  consutum"  or  cut-work,  called  in  French 
"applique,"  is  a  term  of  rather  wide  meaning,  as  it  takes  in  several 
sorts  of  decorative  accompaniments  to  needlework. 

When  anything — flower,  fruit,  or  figure — is  wrought  by  itself 
upon  a  separate  piece  of  silk  or  canvas  and  afterwards  sewed  on 
to  the  vestment  for  church  use,  or  article  for  domestic  purpose,  it 
comes  to  be  known  as  cut-work.  This  kind  of  work  was  employed 
for  dresses  and  vestments  ;  but  we  find  it  most  commonly  on  bed- 
curtains,  hangings  for  rooms  and  halls,  and  other  items  in  house- 
hold furniture. 

Of  cut-work  in  embroidery  those  pieces  of  splendid  Rhenish 
needlework  with  the  blazonment  of  Cleves,  sewed  upon  a  ground 
of  crimson  silk,  nos.  1 194-5,  at  South  Kensington,  and  the 
chasuble  of  crimson  double-pile  velvet,  no.  78,  are  good 
examples.  In  the  last,  the  niches  in  which  the  saints  stand  are 
loom-wrought,  but  those  personages  themselves  are  exquisitely 
worked  on  separate  pieces  of  fine  canvas  and  afterwards  let  into 
the  unwoven  spaces  left  open  for  them.  A  Florentine  piece  of 
cut-work,  no.  5788,  is  alike  remarkable  for  its  great  beauty  and 
the  skill  shown  in  bringing  together  both  weaving  and  embroidery. 
Much  of  the  architectural  accessories  is  loom-wrought,  while  the 
extremities  of  the  evangelists  are  all  done  by  the  needle  \  but  the 
head,  neck,  and  long  beard  are  worked  by  themselves  upon  very 
fine  linen,  and  afterwards  put  together  in  such  a  way  that  the  full 
white  beard  overlaps  the  tunic 


TEXTILES. 


S9 


Other  methods  gave  a  quicker  help  in  this  cut-work.  For  the 
sake  of  expedition  all  the  figures  were  sometimes  at  once  shaped 
out  of  woven  silk,  satin,  velvet,  linen,  or  woollen  cloth  as  wanted, 
and  sewed  upon  the  grounding  of  the  article :  the  features  of  the 
face  and  the  contours  of  the  body  were  then  wrought  by  the  needle 
in  very  narrow  lines  done  in  brown  silk  thread.  At  times,  even 
this  much  of  embroidery  was  set  aside  for  the  painting  brush,  and 
instances  are  to  be  found  in  which  the  spaces  left  uncovered  by 
the  loom  for  the  heads  and  extremities  of  the  human  figures  are 
filled  in  with  the  brush.  Sometimes,  again,  the  cut-work  done  in 
these  ways  is  framed,  as  it  were,  with  an  edging,  either  in  plain  or 
gilt  leather,  hempen,  or  silken  cord,  like  the  leadings  of  a  stained 
glass  window.  Perhaps  in  no  collection  open  anywhere  to  public 
view  can  a  piece  of  cut-work  be  found  so  full  of  teaching  about 
the  process  of  this  easy  way  of  execution  as  no.  1370  at  South 
Kensington :  and  we  earnestly  recommend  the  attention  of  our 
readers  to  that  example. 

For  the  invention  of  cut-work,  or  "di  commesso  "  as  Vasari 
calls  it,  that  writer  tells  us  we  are  indebted  to  one  of  his 
Florentine  countrymen :  "It  was  by  Sandro  Botticelli  that  the 
method  of  preparing  banners  and  standards  in  what  is  called  cut- 
work  was  invented ;  and  this  he  did  that  the  colours  might  not 
sink  through,  showing  the  tint  of  the  cloth  on  each  side.  The 
baldachino  of  Orsanmichele  is  by  this  master,  and  is  so 
treated,  etc."  But  Vasari  is  not  correct:  the  piece  just 
spoken  of,  no.  1370,  was  made  half  a  century  before  Botticelli 
was  born. 

There  are  other  accessories  in  mediaeval  embroidery  which 
ought  not  to  be  overlooked. 

In  some  few  instances,  gold  and  silver  gilt  star-like  flowers  are 
to  be  found  sewed  upon  the  silks  or  amid  the  embroidery  from 
Venice  and  other  provinces  in  Italy,  and  from  southern  Germany. 
Some  fragments  of  silk  damask,  no.  8612,  are  curious  examples  of 
Italian  taste.    These  at  one  time  have  been  thickly  strewed  with 


9° 


TEXTILES. 


trefoils  cut  out  of  gilt  metal  but  very  thin,  and  not  sewed  but  glued 
on  to  the  silk  :  many  of  the  leaves  have  fallen  off,  and  those 
remaining  turned  black.  Precious  stones  also,  coral,  and  seed 
pearls  were  sewed  upon  textiles ;  and,  not  uncommonly,  small 
coloured  beads  and  bugles  of  glass.  Belonging  to  St.  Paul's,  in 
1295,  among  many  other  amices  there  was  one  having  glass  stones 
upon  it,  both  large  and  small. 

Another  form  of  glass  fastened  by  heat  to  gold  and  copper, 
enamel,  was  extensively  employed  as  an  adornment  upon  textiles. 
The  gorgeous  "  chesable  of  red  cloth  of  gold  with  orphreys  before 
and  behind  set  with  pearls,  blue,  white,  and  red,  with  plates  ot 
gold  enamelled,  wanting  fifteen  plates,  etc.,"  described  in 
Dugdale's  Monasticon,  and  given  by  John  of  Gaunt's  duchess 
to  Lincoln  cathedral,  shows  how  this  rich  ornamentation  was 
applied  to  garments,  especially  for  church  use,  in  very  large 
quantities. 

In  England  the  old  custom  was  to  sew  a  great  deal  of  gold- 
smith's work,  for  enrichment,  upon  articles  meant  for  personal 
wear.  When  our  first  Edward's  grave  in  Westminster  abbey  was 
opened  in  1774  there  was  seen  upon  the  body,  besides  other 
silken  robes,  a  stole-like  band  of  rich  white  tissue  about  the  neck 
and  crossed  upon  the  breast :  it  was  studded  with  gilt  quatrefoils 
in  filigree  work  and  embroidered  with  pearls.  From  the  knees 
downwards  the  body  was  wrapped  in  a  pall  of  cloth  of  gold. 
Henry  the  third  gave  a  frontal  to  the  high  altar  in  Westminster 
abbey  upon  which,  besides  carbuncles  in  golden  settings  and 
several  large  pieces  of  enamel,  were  as  many  as  866  smaller  ones  : 
perhaps  the  "  esmaux  de  plique  "  of  the  French. 

In  the  Norman-French  silken  stuffs  thus  ornamented  were  said 
to  be  "batuz,"  that  is,  beaten  with  hammered-up  gold.  The 
Treasury  calendars,  edited  by  Palgrave,  tell  us  that  Richard  the 
second  gave  to  the  chapel  in  the  castle  of  Haverford  "  ii  rydell 
batuz ; v  two  altar-curtains  beaten  (probably  with  ornaments  in 
gilt  silver ;  like  an  amice  so  described  which  belonged  to  St.  Paul's). 


TEXTILES. 


9i 


For  the  secular  employment  of  this  same  sort  of  decoration  we 
have  several  curious  examples.  Ladies'  dresses  were  so  adorned, 
as  we  may  see  in  these  verses  : 

A  coronell  on  hur  hedd  sett, 

Hur  clothys  wyth  bestes  and  byrdes  wer  bete, 

All  abowte  for  pryde. 

King  John  in  12 15  sent  an  order  (extant  in  the  Close  rolls) 
to  Reginald  de  Cornhull  and  William  Cook  to  have  made  for  him, 


Ancient  banner  of  the  city  of  Strasburg :  see  next  page. 


92 


TEXTILES. 


besides  five  tunics,  five  banners  with  his  arms  upon  them, 
well  beaten  in  gold:  "bene  auro  batuatas."  A  very  remarkable 
example  attributed  to  the  fourteenth  century  "  the  banner  of 
Strasbourg"  was  preserved  there  until  very  lately,  when  it 
was  unhappily  destroyed  in  the  bombardment  of  that  city  in 
1870. 

Dugdale  (in  his  Baronage)  gives  the  original  bill  for  fitting  out 
one  of  the  ships  in  which  Beauchamp  earl  of  Warwick,  during  the 
reign  of  Henry  the  sixth,  went  over  to  France.  Among  other  items 
are  these  :  "  Four  hundred  pencils  (long  narrow  strips  of  silk,  used 
as  flags)  beat  with  the  raggedstarT  in  silver  \  the  other  pavys  (one 
of  two  shields  probably  of  wood,  and  fastened  outside  the  ship  at 
its  bows)  painted  with  black,  and  a  raggedstarT  beat  with  silver 
occupying  all  the  field ;  one  coat  for  my  lord's  body,  beat  with 
fine  gold ;  two  coats  for  heralds,  beat  with  demi  gold ;  a  great 
streamer  for  a  ship  of  forty  yeards  in  length  and  eight  yeards  in 
breadth,  with  a  great  bear  and  griffin  holding  a  raggedstarT  poudred 
full  of  raggedstaffs ;  three  penons  (small  flags)  of  satten ;  sixteen 
standards  of  worsted  entailed  with  the  bear  and  a  chain."  The 
quatrefoils  on  the  robe  of  Edward  the  first,  the  silver  lions  on  the 
Glastonbury  cope,  the  beasts  and  birds  on  the  lady's  gown,  the 
bear  and  griffin  and  raggedstarT  belonging  to  the  Beauchamp's 
blazoning,  and  all  similar  enrichments  put  upon  silken  stuffs,  were 
cut  out  of  very  thin  plates  of  gold  or  silver,  so  as  to  hang  upon 
them  lightly,  and  were  hammered  up  to  show  in  low  relief  the 
fashion  of  the  flower  and  the  lineaments  of  the  beast  or  bird  meant 
to  be  represented.  Such  a  style  of  ornamentation  in  gold  or  silver, 
stitched  on  silken  stuffs,  was  far  more  common  once  than  is  now 
thought.  It  had  also  a  technical  description :  in  speaking  of  it 
people  would  either  write  or  say,  "  silk  beaten  with  gold  or  silver ; " 
as,  for  example,  Barbara  Mason  used  the  term  when  in  1538  she 
bequeathed  to  a  church  "  a  vestment  of  grene  sylke  betyn  with 
goold." 

Spangles,  when  they  happened  to  be  used,  were  not  like  those 


TEXTILES. 


now  employed  but  fashioned  after  another  and  artistic  shape,  and 
put  on  in  a  different  manner.  A  fragment  still  exists  from  the 
chasuble  belonging  to  the  set  of  vestments  wrought,  it  is  said,  by 
Isabella  of  Spain  and  her  maids  of  honour  ;  and  used  the  first  time 
high  mass  was  sung  in  Granada,  after  it  had  been  taken  by  the 
Spaniards  from  the  Moors.  Upon  this  are  flowers,  well  thrown  up 
in  relief,  done  in  spangles  on  a  crimson  velvet  ground.  The 
spangles — some  in  gold,  some  in  silver — are,  though  small,  of 
several  sizes;  all  are  voided;  that  is,  hollow  in  the  middle; 
with  the  circumference  not  flat  but  convex,  and  are  sewed  on 
like  tiles,  one  overlapping  the  other,  producing  a  rich  and 
pleasing  effect.  Our  present  spangles,  in  the  flat  shape,  are  quite 
modern. 

Another  kind  of  embroidery  for  garments  was  in  gold,  worked 
sometimes  by  itself,  sometimes  with  coloured  silk  thread  laid  down 
alternately  beside  it ;  so  as  to  lend  a  tinge  of  green,  crimson,  pink, 
or  blue  to  the  imagined  tissue  of  the  robe,  as  if  it  were  made  of  a 
golden  stuff  shot  with  another  tint. 

This  gold  "  passing  "  was  sewn  on.  The  workwomen  taking 
thin  silk,  while  fastening  the  passing,  dotted  it  all  over  in  small 
stitches  set  exactly  in  a  way  that  showed  the  same  pattern.  With 
no  other  appliance  they  were  thus  enabled  to  lend  to  their  draperies 
the  appearance  of  having  been  not  wrought  by  the  needle  but 
actually  cut  out  of  a  piece  of  textile ;  for  which  they  have  been 
sometimes  mistaken. 

Anciently,  also,  in  England  another  mode  of  embroidering 
articles,  either  for  church  use  or  for  household  furniture,  was  by 
darning  or  working  the  subject  upon  linen  netting.  This  was 
called  net-work,  filatorium,  as  we  learn  from  the  Exeter  inventory, 
where  we  read  that  its  cathedral  possessed  in  1327  three  pieces  of 
it  for  use  at  the  altar  :  one  in  particular  for  throwing  over  the  desk. 
These  thread  embroideries  were  chiefly  wrought  during  the  four- 
teenth century;  but  as  early  as  1295  St.  Paul's  had  a  cushion  of 
the  kind. 


TEXTILES. 


,  CrQ&fVet,  knitting  done  with  linen  thread,  and  the  thick 
'kind^'xjf^lace  wrought  (chiefly  in  Flanders)  upon  the  cushion 
with  'bobbins,  were  much  employed  under  the  name  of  nun's 


Embroidered  hangings  of  a  bed  ;  from  a  MS.  of  the  fifteenth 
century,  in  the  British  museum. 


lace  from  the  sixteenth  century  and  upwards,  for  bordering 
altar-cloths,  albs,  and  every  sort  of  towel  required  far  church 
purposes. 


CHAPTER  X. 


Tapestry  is  neither  real  weaving  nor  true  embroidery,  but  in  a 
manner  unites  in  its  working  those  two  processes  into  one. 
Though  wrought  in  a  loom  and  upon  a  warp  stretched  out  along 
its  frame,  it  has  no  woof  thrown  across  those  threads  with  a  shuttle 
or  any  like  appliance  but  its  weft  is  done  with  many  short  threads, 
all  variously  coloured  and  put  in  by  a  needle.  It  is  not  embroid- 
ery, though  so  very  like  it,  for  tapestry  is  not  worked  upon  what 
is  really  a  web,  having  both  warp  and  woof,  but  upon  a  series  of 
closely  set  fine  strings. 

From  the  way  in  which  tapestry  is  spoken  of  in  Holy  Writ 
we  may  be  sure  that  the  art  is  very  old  ;  and  if  it  did  not  take 
its  first  rise  in  Egypt,  we  are  led  by  the  same  authority  to  conclude 
that  it  soon  became  successfully  cultivated  by  the  people  of  that 
land.  The  woman  in  the  book  of  Proverbs  says  :  "  I  have  woven 
my  bed  with  cords.  I  have  covered  it  with  painted  tapestry, 
brought  from  Egypt."  We  find,  therefore,  not  only  that  it  was 
employed  as  an  article  of  household  furniture  among  the  Israelites, 
but  that  the  Egyptians  were  the  makers. 

From  Egypt  through  western  Asia  the  art  of  tapestry-making 
found  its  way  to  Europe,  and  after  many  ages  at  last  to  England. 
Among  the  other  manual  labours  followed  in  religious  houses 
this  handicraft  was  one  ;  and  monks  became  some  of  the  best 
workmen.  The  altars  and  the  walls  of  their  churches  were  hung 
with  tapestry.    Matthew  Paris  tells  us  that  among  other  ornaments 


TEXTILES. 


which,  in  the  reign  of  Henry  the  first,  abbot  Geoffrey  had  made 
for  his  church  of  St.  Alban's  were  three  reredoses ;  the  first  a  large 
one  wrought  with  the  finding  of  the  body  of  St.  Alban  ;  the  other 
two  figured  with  the  parables  of  the  man  who  fell  among  thieves, 
and  of  the  prodigal  son.  While  in  London  in  the  year  1316  Simon 
abbot  of  Ramsey  bought  looms,  staves,  shuttles,  and  a  slay:  "pro 
weblomes  emptis  xxs.  Et  pro  staves  ad  easdem  vjd.  Item  pro 
iiij  shittles  pro  eodem  opere  ijs  yjd.  Item  in  j.  slay  pro  textoribus 
viijd."  Collier,  in  his  history,  quotes  a  letter  from  GirTard,  one  of 
the  commissioners  for  the  suppression  of  the  smaller  houses,  written 
to  Cromwell ;  in  which  he  says,  speaking  of  the  monastery  of 
Wolstrope  in  Lincolnshire  :  "  Not  one  religious  person  there  but 
that  he  can  and  doth  use  either  imbrothering,  writing  books  with 
very  fair  hand,  making  their  own  garments,  carving,  painting,  or 
graving,  etc.,, 

We  may  collect  from  Chaucer  that  working  tapestry  was  not 
an  uncommon  trade;  among  his  pilgrims  he  mentions  in  the 
prologue, 

An  haberdasher  and  a  carpenter, 
A  webbe,  a  dyer,  and  a  tapisser. 

Pieces  of  English-made  fapestry  still  remain.  That  fine  though 
greatly  damaged  specimen  at  St.  Mary's  hall,  Coventry,  represent- 
ing the  marriage  of  Henry  the  sixth,  is  one  ;  a  second  is  the  curious 
reredos  for  an  altar,  belonging  to  the  vintner's  company ;  this  last 
is  figured  with  St.  Martin  on  horseback  cutting  his  cloak  in  two 
that  he  might  give  one  half  to  a  poor  man,  *and  with  St.  Dunstan 
singing  mass.  A  third  piece,  of  large  size  and  in  good  preserva- 
tion, is  in  private  possession,  and  hangs  upon  the  wall  in  a  house 
in  Cornwall.  It  is  one  of  four  pieces,  of  which  two  have  been 
lost,  representing  the  marriage  of  Henry  the  seventh  and  Elizabeth 
of  York;  and  was  probably  made  about  the  year  1490. 

The  art  of  weaving  tapestry  was  successfully  followed  in  many 
parts  of  France  and  throughout  ancient  Flanders ;  where  secular 


TEXTILES. 


97 


trade-guilds  were  formed  for  its  especial  manufacture  in  many  of 
the  towns.    Several  of  these  places  won  for  themselves  an  especial 


Banner  of  the  tapestry  workers  of  Lyons. 


fame ;  but  so  far,  at  last,  did  Arras  outrun  them  all  that  arras-work 
came  to  be  the  common  word,  both  here  and  on  the  continent,  to 
mean  all  sorts  of  tapestry,  whether  wrought  in  England  or  abroad. 
Thus  the  fine  hangings  for  the  choir  of  Canterbury  cathedral, 
now  at  Aix-en-Provence,  though  probably  made  at  home  by  his 
own  monks  and  given  to  that  church  by  prior  Goldston  in  1595, 
are  spoken  of  as  arras-work  :  "  de  arysse  subtiliter  intextos." 

Arras  is  but  one  among  other  terms  by  which,  during  the  middle 
ages,  tapestry  was  called.  Its  earliest  name  was  Saracenic  work ; 
"  opus  Saracenicum ; "  and,  at  first,  tapestry  was  wrought  as  in  the 
east,  in  a  low  or  horizontal  loom.  The  artisans  of  France  and 
Flanders  were  the  first  to  introduce  the  upright  or  vertical  frame, 
afterwards  known  abroad  as  "  de  haute  lisse,"  in  contradistinction 
to  the  low  or  horizontal  frame  called  "  de  basse  lisse."  Workmen 
who  kept  to  the  unimproved  loom  were  known,  in  the  trade,  as 
Saracens,  for  retaining  the  method  of  their  paynim  teachers  ;  and 
their  work,  Saracenic.  In  the  year  1339  John  de  Croisettes,  a 
Saracen-tapestry  worker  living  at  Arras,  sells  to  the  duke  of 

H 


98 


TEXTILES. 


Touraine  a  piece  of  gold  Saracenic  tapestry  figured  with  the  story 
of  Charlemagne  :  "  Jean  de  Croisettes,  tapissier  Sarrazinois  demeu- 
rant  a  Arras,  vend  au  due  de  Touraine  un  tapis  sarrazinois  a  or  de 
Thistoire  de  Charlemaine."  The  high  frame,  however,  soon  super- 
seded the  low  one  ;  and  among  the  pieces  of  tapestry  belonging 
to  Philippe  duke  of  Bourgogne  and  Brabant  many  are  especially 
entered  as  of  the  high  frame ;  one  of  which  is  thus  described  : 
"ung  grant  tapiz  de  haulte  lice,  sauz  or,  de  l'istoire  du  due 
Guillaume  de  Normandie  comment  il  conquist  Engleterre."  A 
very  fine  example  is  still  to  be  seen  in  the  collection  at  the  Louvre, 
representing  the  history  of  St.  Martin. 


TEXTILES. 


99 


With  the  upright,  as  with  the  flat  frame,  the  workman  had  to 
grope  in  the  dark  a  great  deal  upon  his  path.  In  both,  he  was 
obliged  to  put  in  the  threads  on  the  back  or  wrong  side  of  the 
piece,  following  his  sketch  as  best  he  could  behind  the  strings  or 
warp.  As  the  face  was  downward  in  the  flat  frame  it  was  much 
less  easy  to  observe  and  correct  a  fault.  In  the  upright  frame  he 
might  go  in  front,  and  with  his  own  work  in  open  view  on  one 
hand  and  the  original  design  full  before  him  on  the  other,  he 
could  mend  as  he  went  on,  step  by  step,  the  smallest  mistake, 
were  it  but  a  single  thread.  Put  side  by  side,  when  finished,  the 
pieces  from  the  upright  frame  were  in  beauty  and  perfection  far 
beyond  those  from  the  flat  one.  We  can  scarcely  particularize 
the  details  in  which  that  superiority  consisted,  for  not  one  single 
flat  sample  is  to  be  identified  as  certain  from  evidence  within  our 
reach.  It  is  possible  that  at  South  Kensington  the  specimens 
nos.  1296  and  1465  are  "Saracenic;"  that  is,  wrought  in  the  low 
flat  loom,  or  "  de  basse  lisse  ; "  but  all  the  rest  are  of  the 
"  de  haute  lisse,"  worked  in  the  upright  frame.  The  "  weaver"  is 
among  the  trades  engraved  in  the  curious  volume  printed  at 
Frankfort  in  1574,  de  mechanicis  artibus,  with  plates  by  Amman. 

When  the  illuminators  of  manuscripts  began  to  put  in  golden 
shadings  all  over  their  painting  the  tapestry-workers  did  the 
same.  Such  a  manner  cannot  be  relied  on  as  a  criterion  whereby 
to  judge  of  the  exact  place  where  any  specimen  of  tapestry  had 
been  wrought,  or  to  tell  its  precise  age.  To  work  figures  on  a 
golden  ground  and  to  shade  garments,  buildings,  and  landscapes 
with  gold,  are  two  different  things.  Upon  several  pieces  at  South 
Kensington  gold  thread  has  been  very  plentifully  used,  but  the 
metal  is  of  so  debased  a  quality  that  it  has  become  almost  black. 

The  use  of  tapestry  for  church  decoration  and  household 
furniture,  both  in  England  and  abroad,  was  for  a  long  period 
very  great.  Many  large  pieces,  mostly  of  a  scriptural  character, 
were  provided  by  cardinal  Wolsey  for  his  palace  at  Hampton 
court.    In  the  next  generation,  a  very  famous  set  was  made  in 

h  2 


The  Weaver ;  from  the  engraving  by  J.  Amman. 


Flanders,  which  for  many  years  decorated  the  walls  of  the  House 
of  Lords  :  it  represented  the  defeat  of  the  Spanish  Armada.  This 
magnificent  memorial  was  destroyed  in  the  fire  of  1834.  One 
fragment  only  is  known  to  exist.  This  piece  was  cut  out  to  make 
way  for  a  gallery  at  the  time  of  the  trial  of  queen  Caroline,  and 
was  secreted  by  a  German  servant  of  the  Lord  Chamberlain. 
The  relic  was  bought  some  years  after  for  ^20  and  presented  to 
the  corporation  of  Plymouth,  who  still  possess  it. 

The  most  beautiful  series  now  in  the  world  is  in  the  Vatican  at 
Rome,  and  may  be  judged  of  by  looking  at  a  few  of  the  original  car- 
toons (at  present  in  the  S.  K.  museum).  Duke  Cosimo  tried  to  set 
up  tapestry  work  at  Florence  but  did  not  succeed.  Later,  Rome 
produced  some  good  things ;  among  others,  the  fine  copy  of  Da 
Vinci's  Last  Supper  still  hung  up  on  Maunday  Thursday.  Eng- 


TEXTILES.  Z    VI 01  ^\ 

K\  K>-  &\ 

land  made  several  attempts  to  re-introduce  the  manufacturer 
at  Mortlake,  then  afterwards  in  London,  at  Soho.  Wor^steom^ 
these  two  establishments  may  be  met  with.    At  Northumber^^  ^ 
house  there  was  a  room  hung  with  large  pieces  of  tapestry  wrought 
at  Soho,  and  for  that  mansion,  in  the  year  1758.    The  designs 
were  by  Francesco  Zuccherelli  and  consisted  of  landscapes  com- 
posed of  hills  crowned  here  and  there  with  the  standing  ruins  of 
temples  or  strewed  with  broken  columns,  among  which  groups 
of  country  folks  are  wandering  and  amusing  themselves.  Mort- 
lake and  Soho  were  failures.    Not  so  the  Gobelins  at  Paris,  as 
every  one  well  knows. 

In  many  English  houses,  especially  in  the  country,  good 
samples  of  late  Flemish  tapestry  may  be  found.  Close  to  Lon- 
don, Holland  house  is  adorned  with  some  curious  specimens,  par- 
ticularly in  the  raised  style.  An  earlier  example  (engraved  on  the 
next  page)  of  the  fifteenth  century,  representing  the  marriage  of 
Louis  XII.  and  Anne  of  Brittany  is  in  a  foreign  collection. 

Imitated  tapestry  existed  here  long  ago  under  the  name  ot 
"stayned  cloth,"  and  the  workers  of  it  were  embodied  into  a 
London  guild.  At  the  beginning  of  the  sixteenth  century  Exeter 
cathedral  had  several  pieces  of  old  painted  or  "  stayned"  cloth  : 
"  i  front  stayned  cum  crucifixo,  Maria  et  Johanne,  Petro  et  Paulo ; 
viij  panni  linei  stayned,  etc."  The  great  use  at  that  time  of  such 
articles  in  household  furniture  may  be  witnessed  in  the  will,  1503, 
of  Katherine  lady  Hastings  who  bequeaths,  besides  several  other 
such  pieces,  "  an  old  hangin  of  counterfeit  arres  of  Knollys,  which 
now  hangeth  in  the  hall  and  all  such  hangyings  of  old  bawdekyn, 
or  lynen  paynted  as  now  hang  in  the  chappell."  We  may  also 
remember  that  Falstaff  speaks  of  it  as  an  illustration  easily  under- 
stood ;  he  says  that  his  troops  are  "  as  ragged  as  Lazarus  in  the 
painted  cloth." 

Carpets  are  akin  to  tapestry,  and  though  the  use  of  them  may 
perhaps  be  not  so  ancient  yet  is  very  old.  Here,  again,  we  must 
look  to  the  people  of  Asia  for  the  finest  as  well  as  the  earliest 


102 


TEX11LES. 


Marriage  of  Louis  XII.  and  Anne  of  Brittany. 


examples  of  this  textile.  Mediaeval  specimens  are  rare  anywhere, 
and  we  are  glad  to  recommend  attention  to  two  pieces  of  that 
period  fortunately  in  the  collection  at  South  Kensington,  no.  8649, 
ot  the  fourteenth  century,  and  no.  8357,  of  the  sixteenth,  both  of 
Spanish  make. 

The  chambers  of  our  royal  palaces  and  the  chancels  of  our 
parish  churches  used  to  be  strewed  with  rushes.  When  however 
they  could  afford  it  the  authorities  of  our  cathedrals,  even  in  very 


TEXTILES. 


103 


•early  times,  spread  the  sanctuary  with  carpets;  and  at  last  old 
tapestry  came  to  be  so  employed,  as  now  in  Italy.  Among  such 
coverings  for  the  floor  before  the  altar  Exeter  had  a  large  piece  of 
Arras  cloth  figured  with  the  life  of  the  duke  of  Burgundy,  the  gift 
of  one  of  its  bishops,  Edmund  Lacy,  in  1420  ;  besides  two  large 
carpets,  one  bestowed  by  bishop  Nevill  in  1456,  the  other,  of  a 
chequered  pattern,  by  lady  Elizabeth  Courtney :  "  carpet  et 
panni  coram  altari  sternendi ;  i  pannus  de  Arys  de  historia  ducis 
Burgundie  ;  i  larga  carpeta,  etc."  In  an  earlier  inventory  we  find 
that  among  the  "  bancaria"  or  bench-coverings  in  the  choir  of  the 
same  cathedral,  one  was  a  large  piece  of  English-made  tapestry 
with  a  fretted  pattern.  It  is  very  probable  that  as  the  work  of  the 
Record  Commission  goes  on,  and  our  ancient  historians  are 
printed,  evidence  may  be  found  that  the  looms  at  work  in  all  our 
great  monasteries  among  other  webs  wrought  carpets.  From 
existing  testimony  we  believe  that  such  must  have  been  the  prac- 
tice at  Croyland,  where  abbot  Egelric  (the  second  of  the  name) 
gave  to  that  church,  before  the  year  992,  "  two  large  foot-cloths 
[so  carpets  were  then  called]  .woven  with  lions  to  be  laid  out 
before  the  high  altar  on  great  festivals,  and  two  shorter  ones 
trailed  all  over  with  flowers,  for  the  feast  days  of  the  apostles." 
The  quantity  of  carpeting  in  our  palaces  may  be  seen  by  the  way 
in  which  Leland  tells  us  that  "  my  lady  the  queen's  rooms  "  were 
strewed  with  them  "  when  she  took  her  chamber.  " 


CHAPTER  XL 


The  value  of  such  a  collection  of  textile  fabrics  as  that  at  South 
Kensington  can  scarcely  be  overrated.  Without  such  aid  it  is 
not  possible  for  the  painter  or  the  historian  to  bring  before  his 
own  mind,  much  less  bring  before  another's,  a  true  representation 
of  ancient  ceremonies  and  pageants.  Whether  his  subject  be  a 
coronation  or  a  royal  marriage,  a  queen's  "  taking  her  chamber," 
a  progress,  or  a  funeral,  he  cannot  correctly  set  forth  the  splen- 
dour or  the  details  of  the  occasion,  unless  he  can  refer  to  existing 
examples  of  the  cloths  of  gold,  the  figured  velvets,  the  rich  em* 
broidery,  or  the  splendid  silks,  which  used  to  be  worn  of  old.  Take 
for  example  no s.  13 10  and  8624.  Upon  these  are  figured  stags 
with  tall  branching  horns,  couchant,  chained,  upturning  their 
antlered  heads  to  sunbeams  darting  down  upon  them  amid  a 
shower  of  rain \  and  beneath  the  stags  are  eagles.  This  Sicilian 
textile,  woven  about  the  end  of  the  fourteenth  century,  brings  to 
one's  mind  the  bronze  recumbent  figure  of  a  king  in  Westminster 
abbey.  It  is  that  of  Richard  the  second ;  made  for  him  before  his 
downfall,  and  by  two  coppersmiths  of  London,  Nicholas  Broker 
and  Godfrey  Prest.  This  effigy,  once  finely  gilt,  is  as  remarkable 
for  its  beautiful  workmanship  as  for  the  elaborate  manner  in  which 
the  cloak  and  kirtle  worn  by  the  king  are  diapered  all  over  with  a 
pattern,  copied  from  the  silken  stuff  out  of  which  those  garments 
must  have  been  cut  for  his  personal  wear  while  living.  The 


TEXTILES. 


pattern  consists  of  a  sprig  of  the  planta  genesta,  the  humble- 
broom  plant — the  haughty  Plantagenet's  device — along  with  a 
couchant  hart  chained  and  gazing  straight  forwards,  and  above  it 
a  cloud  with  rays  darting  up  from  behind.  These  were  Richard's 
favourite  cognizances  :  the  one  from  his  grandfather  Edward  the 
third  ;  the  other  from  his  mother  Joan  of  Kent.  It  is  very  pro- 
bable that  the  king's  dress  was  of  the  same  kind  of  silk  Sicilian 
textile  as  the  examples  just  referred  to  :  and  that  those  very 
examples  are  portions  of  pieces  wrought,  perhaps  at  Palermo,  for 
the  court  of  Richard.  They  are  of  the  same  date  and  they  show 
his  devices ;  the  chained  hart  and  the  sunbeams  issuing  from  a 
cloud. 

The  seemliness,  not  to  say  comfort,  of  private  life  was  im- 
proved by  the  use  of  textiles.  Let  the  historian  contrast  the 
custom  even  in  a  royal  palace,  during  the  middle  ages,  with  that 
now  followed  in  every  tradesman's  home.  Then  straw  and  rushes 
were  strewed  in  houses  upon  the  floor  in  every  room ;  and  Wen- 
dover,  in  his  life  of  St.  Thomas,  speaks  of  the  king's  courtiers 
platting  knots  with  the  litter,  and  flinging  them  with  a  gibe  at  a 
man  who  had  been  slighted  by  the  prince.  Not  quite  a  hundred 
years  later  when  Eleanor  of  Castile  came  to  London  for  her 
marriage  with  our  first  Edward  she  found  her  lodgings  furnished, 
under  the  directions  of  the  Spanish  courtiers  who  had  arrived 
before  her,  with  hangings  and  curtains  of  silk  around  the  walls, 
and  carpets  spread  upon  the  ground.  This  offended  some  of  the 
people ;  more  of  them,  as  Matthew  Paris  records,  laughed  at  the 
thought  that  such  costly  things  were  laid  down  to  be  walked 
upon. 

Take,  again,  the  famous  Syon  cope.  Not  only  is  it  full  of 
interest  to  writers  upon  liturgies  and  rituals  but  of  even  more  to 
the  herald  and  genealogist.  Covered  as  its  orphreys  are  with 
armorial  bearings,  this  cope  carries  with  it  evidences  as  important 
and  as  valuable  as  any  contemporary  roll  of  arms ;  and  no  in- 
quirer into  the  pedigrees  of  the  ancient  families  of  the  Percies  or 


io6 


TEXTILES. 


Ferrers,  of  Cliffords  or  Botelers,  and  of  many  others,  can  afford  to 
neglect  it. 

We  have  several  records  of  evidence  in  courts  of  law  taken 
from  heraldic  embroideries  upon  robes  and  vestments.  In  the 
famous  controversy  between  the  houses  of  Scrope  and  Grosvenor, 
in  the  fourteenth  century,  inquiries  were  made  and  proofs  were 
offered  on  both  sides  as  to  the  right  of  bearing  upon  their  shields 
the  bend  or  upon  a  field  azure.  Witnesses  produced  at  West- 
minster corporas  cases,  copes,  and  albs  embroidered  with  the  arms 
of  Scrope.  Chaucer  was  one  of  the  witnesses ;  and  said  he  had 
seen  those  arms  on  banners  and  vestments  and  commonly  called 
the  arms  of  Scrope.  Again ;  the  fact  that  in  her  wardrobe  was 
found  a  vestment  embroidered  with  the  royal  arms  was  brought 
forward  to  prove  the  charge  of  treason  against  the  old  countess  of 
Salisbury,  the  mother  of  cardinal  Pole  ;  and  for  which  crime  she 
was  condemned. 

Collections  of  ancient  textiles  are  of  still  greater  use  to  stu- 
dents of  ecclesiastical  history  and  church  rituals  than  even  to  the 
secular  historian.  It  is  probable  that  the  greater  number  of  the 
specimens  which  now  exist  formed  originally  portions  of  sacred 
vestments  and  furniture  for  altars.  Formerly  so  common,  frag- 
ments even  of  such  cloths  and  robes  have  become  of  very  great 
rarity,  especially  in  England;  where  for  the  last  two  or  three 
centuries  the  use  of  the  numerous  old  church-vestments  and  deco- 
rations has  entirely  ceased. 

Again,  for  example:  the  three  cases  nos.  5958,  8329,  and 
8327  are  of  the  kind  known  as  the  "  capsella  cum  serico  decenter 
ornata  "  of  the  mediaeval  writers ;  small  cases  or  boxes  decently 
fitted  up  with  silk;  or  the  "  capsula  corporalium,"  the  box  in 
which  were  kept  the  corporals  or  square  pieces  of  fine  linen, 
required  for  service  during  holy  week.  The  name  as  well  as  the 
use  of  this  appliance  is  very  old,  and  both  are  spoken  of  in  the 
very  ancient  '  Ordines  Romani '  edited  by  Mabillon.  One  of 
these,  in  the  rubric  for  Good  Friday,  speaks  of  the  Host  as 


TEXTILES, 


107 


having  been  kept  in  the  corporal's  case  or  box  :  "in  capsula  cor- 
porialium."  In  England,  such  small  wooden  boxes  covered  with 
silks  and  velvets  richly  embroidered  were  once  employed  for  the 
same  purpose :  and  several  are  mentioned  in  the  Exeter  inven- 
tories. 

The  two  pyx-cloths,  110s.  8342  and  8691,  have  an  especial 
interest  for  the  student  of  mediaeval  liturgy.  There  was  a  custom 
during  the  middle  ages  in  England,  as  well  as  in  France  and 
several  other  countries  on  the  continent,  of  keeping  the  Eucharist 
hung  up  over  the  high  altar  beneath  a  canopy,  within  a  pyx  of 
gold,  silver,  ivory,  or  enamel,  mantled  with  a  fine  linen  cloth  or 
veil.  This  veil  for  the  pyx  was  sometimes  embroidered  with 
golden  thread  and  coloured  silks.  Such  an  one  is  mentioned  in 
the  records  of  the  Exchequer,  edited  by  Palgrave :  among  the 
valuables  belonging  to  Richard  the  second  in  Haverford  castle 
and  sent  by  the  sheriff  of  Hereford  to  the  exchequer,  at  the 
beginning  of  the  reign  of  Henry  the  fourth,  were  "  i  coupe  d'or 
pour  le  Corps  Ihu  Cryst.  i  towayll  ove  (avec)  i  longe  parure  de 
mesure  la  suyte." 

Several  names  were  given  to  this  fine  linen  covering.  In  the 
inventory  of  things  taken  from  Dr.  Caius,  and  in  the  college  of  his 
own  founding  at  Cambridge,  are  "  corporas  clothes,  with  the  pix 
and  '  sindon  '  and  canopie."  This  variety  in  nomenclature  doubt- 
less has  led  some  writers  to  state  that  before  Mary  queen  of  Scots 
laid  her  head  upon  the  block  she  had  a  "  corporal,"  strictly  so 
called,  bound  over  her  eyes  :  as  it  is  given  in  one  of  our  histories 
of  England,  "  a  handkerchief  in  which  the  Eucharist  had  formerly 
been  enclosed."  But  this  bandage  must  have  been  the  veil  for  a 
pyx.  As  Mary  wrought  much  with  her  needle,  and  specimens  of 
her  work  yet  remain  at  Chatsworth  and  at  Greystock,  this  piece 
may  have  been  embroidered  by  her  own  hand  and  perhaps  also 
had  been  once  used. 

One  of  these  old  English  pyx  or  Corpus  Christi  cloths,  was 
found  a  few  years  ago  at  the  bottom  of  a  chest  in  Hessett  church, 


io8 


TEXTILES. 


Suffolk.  As  it  is  a  remarkable  specimen  of  the  ingenious  handi- 
craft of  our  mediaeval  countrywomen  it  deserves  description.  To 
make  this  pyx-cloth  a  piece  of  thick  linen,  about  two  feet  square, 
was  chosen,  and  being  marked  off  into  small  equal  widths  on  all 
its  four  edges,  the  threads  at  every  other  space  were,  both  in  the 
warp  and  woof,  pulled  out.  The  checquers  or  squares  so  pro- 
duced were  then  drawn  in  by  threads  tied  on  the  under  side, 
having  the  shape  of  stars,  so  well  and  delicately  worked  that,  till 
it  had  been  narrowly  looked  into,  the  piece  was  thought  to  be 
guipure  lace.  An  old  alb,  no.  8710,  and  an  amice-,  8307,  having 
the  apparels  yet  remaining  upon  both,  are  well  worth  attention  on 
account  of  somewhat  similar  curious  ornamental  needlework  in 
an  intricate  manner.  In  the  middle  ages  in  England  it  was  not 
unusual  to  suspend  upon  pastoral  staffs,  just  below  the  crook, 
a  piece  of  fine  linen.  We  see  them  represented  on  effigies  and  in 
illuminations  ;  but  existing  examples  are  of  the  utmost  rarity. 
Two  are  at  South  Kensington  :  nos.  8279  A,  and  8662. 

There  are  also  there  several  specimens  of  the  christening 
cloaks,  anciently  in  use.  These  were  not  only  conspicuous  in 
royal  christenings  but,  varying  in  costliness  according  to  the 
parent's  rank,  were  handed  down  in  inventories  and  wills.  At  the 
christening  of  Arthur  prince  of  Wales,  eldest  son  of  Henry  the 
eighth,  "my  lady  Cecill,  the  queen's  eldest  sister,  bare  the  prince 
wrapped  in  a  mantell  of  cremesyn  clothe  of  golde  furred  with 
ermyn,"  etc.  Shakespeare  makes  the  shepherd,  in  the  Winter's 
tale,  cry  out,  "  Here's  a  sight  for  thee ;  look  thee,  a  bearing  cloth 
for  a  squire's  child ! "  A  well-to-do  tradesman,  whose  will  is 
printed  among  the  Bury  wills,  bequeathed  in  1648  to  his  daughter 
Rose  his  "  beareing  cloath,  such  .  .  .  linnen  as  is  belonginge 
to  infants  at  their  tyme  of  baptisme." 

Small  square  pieces  of  embroidered  linen  are  sometimes  found 
in  country  houses  in  some  old  chest,  of  which  the  original  use  is 
said  not  to  be  now  known.  But  in  most  cases  these  were  made 
for  children's  quilts  ;  and  very  often  have  the  emblems  of  the 


TEXTILES. 


evangelists  figured  at  the  corners  :  reminding  us  of  tne  nursery 
rhyme,  once  common  both  in  England  and  abroad — 

"  Matthew,  Mark,  Luke,  and  John, 
Bless  the  bed  that  I  lie  on." 

The  quilts  also  for  grown  people  were  ornamented  in  the  same 
way.  At  Durham,  in  1446,  in  the  dormitory  of  the  priory  was  a 
quilt  "  cum  iiij  or  evangelistis  in  corneriis." 

Very  few  examples  now  exist  of  the  ceremonial  shoe  anciently 
worn  by  bishops.  These  were  of  velvet,  or  damask,  or  strong 
linen  embroidered.  One  is  preserved  at  South  Kensington,  no. 
1290  :  another,  once  worn  by  Waynflete  bishop  of  Winchester,  is 
still  at  Magdalen  college,  Oxford.  We  learn  from  the  York  wills 
that  these  shoes  were  a  part  of  the  episcopal  vestments  :  bishop 
Pudsey  left  his  mitre,  staff,  and  sandals,  "et  csetera  episcopalia," 
to  Durham  cathedral  in  1195.  Later  the  name  of  "  sabatines" 
was  given  them ;  and  archbishop  Bo  wet's  inventory  mentions  two 
pairs :  "  pro  j  pare  de  sabbatones,  brouddird  et  couch'  cum 
perelP  ;  pro  j  pare  de  sabbatones  de  albo  panno  auri." 

Collections  of  textile  fabrics  are  of  the  highest  value  to  the 
artist.  There  is  none,  anywhere,  so  rich  or  complete  as  that  at 
South  Kensington ;  and  before  it  was  purchased  for  public  use, 
painters  were  glad  to  refer  to  any  scanty  collection  in  private 
hands,  or  to  old  pictures  or  illuminated  manuscripts,  or  en- 
gravings. 

But,  now,  artists  may  see  pieces  of  the  actual  stuffs  represented 
in  the  pictures,  say,  of  the  national  Gallery.  For  example  :  in 
Orcagna's  coronation  of  the  blessed  Virgin  the  blue  silk  diapered 
in  gold,  with  flowers  and  birds,  hung  as  a  back  ground;  our 
Lord's  white  tunic  diapered  in  gold  with  foliage ;  the  mantle  of 
His  mother  made  of  the  same  stuff;  St.  Stephen's  dalmatic  of 
green  samit,  diapered  with  golden  foliage,  are  Sicilian  in  design 
and  copied  from  the  rich  silks  which  came,  in  the  middle  of  the 
fourteenth  century,  from  the  looms  of  Palermo.    While  standing 


no 


TEXTILES. 


before  Jacopo  di  Casentino's  St.  John  our  eye  is  drawn  to  the 
orphrey  on  that  evangelist's  chasuble  embroidered,  after  the 
Tuscan  style,  with  barbed  quatrefoils,  shutting  in  the  busts  of 
apostles.  Isotta  da  Ramini,  in  her  portrait  by  Pietro  della  Fran- 
cesca,  wears  a  gown  made  of  velvet  and  gold  like  the  cut  velvets 
at  South  Kensington. 

So,  again,  instead  of  copying  patterns  taken  from  the  rich 
cloth  of  gold  worn  by  St.  Laurence  in  Francia's  picture,  or  from 
the  mantle  of  the  doge  in  that  by  Cappaccio,  or  from  the  foot- 
cloths  on  the  steps  in  the  pictures  by  Melozzo  da  Forli,  he  may 
find  for  his  authorities  in  the  same  collection  existing  specimens  of 
contemporary  and  similar  fabrics. 

Not  merely  artists  of  a  higher  class  but  decorators  also  may 
be  equally  benefited  by  the  patterns  and  examples  preserved  of 
old  wall-hangings  and  tapestry.  From  early  times  up  to  the 
middle  of  the  sixteenth  century  our  cathedrals  and  parish 
churches,  our  castles  and  manorial  houses,  in  short  the  dwellings 
of  the  wealthy  everywhere,  used  to  be  ornamented  with  wall- 
painting  done  not  in  "  fresco  "  but  in  "  secco  ; "  that  is,  distemper. 
Upon  high  festivals  the  walls  of  the  churches  were  overspread 
with  tapestry  and  needle-work  ;  so,  too,  those  in  the  halls  of 
palaces,  for  some  solemn  ceremonial. 

Warton,  in  his  history  of  English  poetry,  gives  a  passage  from 
Bradshaw's  life  of  St.  Werburgh  written  late  in  the  sixteenth 
century,  from  which  a  few  lines  are  well  worth  quotation.  He  is 
describing  how  a  large  hall  was  arrayed  for  a  great  feast : 

All  herbes  and  flowers,  fragraunt,  fayre  and  swete 
Were  strawed  in  halles,  and  layd  under  theyr  fete. 
Clothes  of  gold  and  arras  were  hanged  in  the  hall 
Depaynted  with  pyctures  and  hystoryes  manyfolde, 
Well  wroughte  and  craftely. 

The  story  of  Adam,  Noe,  and  his  shyppe ;  the  twelve  sones  of 
Jacob  ;  the  ten  plagues  of  Egypt,  and — 


TEXTILES. 


in 


Duke  Josue  was  joyned  after  them  in  pycture, 
■*##*# 

Theyr  noble  actes  and  tryumphes  marcyall 
Freshly  were  browdred  in  these  clothes  royall 
***** 

But  over  the  hye  desse  in  pryncypall  place 
Where  the  sayd  thre  kynges  sat  crowned  all 
The  best  hallynge  hanged  as  reason  was, 
Whereon  were  wrought  the  ix  orders  angelicall, 
Dyvyded  in  thre  ierarchyses,  not  cessing  to  call, 
Sanctus,  Sanctus,  Sanctus,  blessed  be  the  Trynite, 
Dominus  Deus  Sabaoth,  thre  persons  in  one  deyte. 

Specimens  of  tapestry  of  the  later  mediaeval  period  may  not 
uncommonly  be  found  :  but  not  so  pieces  of  room  hangings, 
u  hallings,"  such  as  those  at  South  Kensington,  nos.  1370,  1297, 
and  1465.    Similar  examples  are,  we  believe,  unknown. 

We  will  add  a  few  words  only  on  one  other,  and  that  not 
a  trivial,  part  of  ancient  dress ;  namely,  gloves.  Formerly 
these  were  much  more  ornamented  than  now;  and,  when 
meant  for  ladies'  wear,  sometimes  perfume  was  bestowed  upon 
them.  Among  the  new  year's  day  presents  to  queen  Mary, 
before  she  came  to  the  throne,  was  "  a  payr  of  gloves  embrawret 
with  gold."  A  year  afterwards  "x  payr  of  Spanyneshe  gloves 
from  a  duches  in  Spayne"  came  to  her ;  and  but  a  month  before, 
Mrs.  Whellers  had  sent  to  her  highness  "  a  pair  of  swete  gloves." 
Shakespeare,  true  to  the  manners  of  his  day,  after  making  Au- 
tolycus  chant  the  praises  of  his 

Lawn  as  white  as  driven  snow  ; 
Cyprus,  black  as  e'er  was  crow  ; 
Gloves,  as  sweet  as  damask  roses  ; 

puts  this  into  the  mouth  of  the  shepherdess  :  "  Come,  you  pro- 
mised me  a  tawdry  lace,  and  a  pair  of  sweet  gloves."  We  may 
find  a  pair  of  such  gloves  in  the  South  Kensington  collection,  no. 
4665. 

It  may  be  proper  to  add,  in  conclusion,  that  the  greater  part 


State  gloves  formerly  belonging  to  Louis  XIII. 


of  the  very  valuable  and  extensive  collection  of  mediaeval  textile 
fabrics  at  South  Kensington  was  collected  by  Dr.  Bock,  a  canon 
of  Aix  la  Chapelle;  and  purchased  from  him  about  the  year 
1864. 


v.*. 


INDEX. 


PAGE 


Acca,  silks       .       .       .  70 

Amasis,  his  linen  corsltt  .  .  5 
Anne  of  Cleves,  her  pall  of  cloth 

of  gold        .       .       .  .41 

Areste,  cloth  of        .        .  74 

„      not  Arras    .       .  75 

Aristotle  first  mentions  silk       .  8 

Arras,  a  name  for  tapestry  .  97 
Aurelian,  refuses  his  wife  a  silk 

robe    .       .       .              •  9 

Babylon,  embroideries      .        .  79 

Baldachino,  from  baudekin        .  42 

Banner  01  Strasburg         .        .  92 

.,     at  Lyons      .       .        .  97 

Bath,  famous  for  weaving  .        .  65 

Baudekin,  a  costly  stuff    .        .  40 

,,       origin  of  name  .        .  40 

41  Batuz,''  its  meaning      .       .  90 

Block-printed  linens  .  .  67 
Blodbendes  .  .  .  .11 
Blodius,  blue  colour  .       .  .76 

Boadicea,  her  cloak  ...  3 

Bordalisaunder,  explained  .        .  72 

British  bards,  distinction  of  dress  3 

Bruges,  her  looms  famous         .  67 

Buckram,  why  so  called    .        .  72 
Byzantine  textiles     .        .  .50 
„       not  good  examples  at 

South  Kensington  .  50 


Cadas,  or  carduus,  a  silken  stuff  30 


I'AGE 


Camoca,  or  camak,  how  used  .  30 
Canvas,  origin  of  name  .  .  4 
Care -cloth,  explained  .  .72 
Carpets  .  .  .  .  .  ioi 
Cecily,  Saint,  her  robe  .  .16 
Cendal  explained  .  .  .  27 
Chasubles  of  stauracin  .  -37 
not  to  be  made  of  fus- 
tian .  .  73 
Childeric,  his  burial  garment  .  16 
Chinese  textiles  .  .  -49 
„  patterned  silks  .  .71 
Chrysoclavus  explained  .  .  35 
Ciclatoun  .  .  .  .18 
Cingula,  explained  .  .  .12 
Cloaks  for  christenings  .  .  108 
Cloth  of  gold,  two  kinds    .  1 9 

„     "stayned"    .        .  .101 

Cloths  of  estate  .  .  .42 
Copper   used   to   imitate  gold 

thread         .       .       .  .21 

Cotton,  native  home         .  .  3 

"  Colayn"  ribbon    .       »  .69 

Cologne  orphrey  webs      .  .69 

Colours  of  silks,  mediaeval  .  75 

Corporal,  said  to  be  used  by 

Mary  of  Scotland  .        .  .107 

Crochet,  or  "  nun's  lace"  .  .  94 

Cyclas,  a  splendid  garment  .  27 

Dalmatic   of    Charlemagne  at 
Rome  .....  38 

„       Byzantine       .  .  50 
1 


H4 


TEXTILES. 


PAGE 


Darius,  his  dress  described        .    1 5 
Damasks,  French     .       .  .68 
„      why  so. named  .  .71 
"  De  fundato,"  a  pattern  on  silk  .  38 
Diaper,  a  silk  .       .       .  .32 
„     possible  origin  of  name .  32 
„     the  meaning  extended  .  33 
Dorneck,  explained  .       .  .72 


Durham  cathedral,  vestments  25,  28 

Eastern. princes,  insignia  on  their 
robes   .       .       .       .       •  45 

Eagle  and  other  birds,  woven 
on  standards        .        .        •  47 

Edward  the   first,  his   gift  of 


"  cyclases "  .       .       .  .27 
Episcopal  shoes        .       .  .109 
Egyptian  work  of  the  loom       .  5 
,,       silver  and  gold  wire    .  22 
„       loom        .       .       .  79 
Embroidery     .        .        .  79 
,,        covering  ancient 

dresses        .       .  80 
„        raised  on  book  covers  86 
,,        involved  great  labour  86 
English  textiles        .        .  .64 
Exeter  cathedral,  vestments,  25, 
28,  29,  31,  33,  46,  48,  58, 
^3>  65,  73 
Eyiesham,  famous  for  linen       .  64 

"  Filatorium,"  its  meaning  .  93 

Filfot,  explained       .        .  .38 

Flax,  grows  wild  in  Britain  .  4 

,,    earliest  history  .       .  4 

Flemish  textiles       .       .  .66 

Florence,  her  silks  and  velvets  .  63 

„      specimens    at  South 

Kensington    .  .  63 

„      cut-work  .       .  .88 

French  silks            .       .  .68 

Frontal,  at  Westminster  .  .  90 
Fustian,  known  in  13th  century  31 

„      originally  from  Egypt  .  73 

,,     woven  at  Naples  .  .  74 

Fygury,  silks  so  called      .  -34 

Gammadion,  explained  .  .36 
Garland,  an  Englishman  .  .11 
Gems,  etc.,  sewn  on  textiles  .  89 
Genoa,  her  silks  .  .  59 
„  specimens  at  South  Ken- 
sington    .        .  .60 


page 


Gilding,  used  for  textiles  .  .21 
Gloves,  embroidered         .  .111 
Gold,  used  in  weaving       .  15 
„   cloths  made  of  gold  alone  16,  17 
,,   see  "  copper  "  . 
Greek  monks,  first  bring  silk- 
worms        ....  9 

Haconbie  church  vestments  .  67 
Hebrew  word  used  improperly  for 

silk   7 

„  embroidery  .  .  .  79 
Heliogabalus,  first  wore  whole- 
silk  .....  9 
Hemp,  native  home  ...  3 
Heraldic  charges  on  Sicilian  silk  56 
Herod,  his  dress  of  woven  silver  22 
Holosericum,  explained  .  .  24 
Honorius,  his  wife's  robe  .  .16 
Hullings,  i.e.  hangings       .    46,  66 

Imperial,  a  rich  silk  .  .  .39 
„      meaning  of  the  name  40 

Indian,  ancient  splendour  of  dress  15 
„     textiles         .        .  .50 

Italy,  northern,  mediaeval  silks  .  58 

Irish  cloth,  in  King  John's  time  66 

King  Henry  the  third  orders  cloth 
of  Areste      .       .       .  -74 
,,   Edward  the  second  orders 

English  embroidery       .  85 
,,    Richard  the  second,  gifts  to 

Haverford  castle   .        .  90 

Lama  d'oro  of  Italy  .  .  .15 
Letters  woven  on   textiles,  an 

ancient  practice     .        .  -47 
Liber  pontificalis,  a  valuable  book .  35 
Lincoln  cathedral,  vestments     .  23 
Looms,  upright  and  horizontal  .  64 
Lucca,  her  silks        .        .  .58 
„     cloths  of  gold         .  .58 
„     specimens  at  South  Ken- 
sington     .       .  -59 

"  Marble "  silk         .        .  .76 

Milan,  her  textiles    .       .  .  63 

Moresco-Spanish  textiles  .  .  53 

Mortuary  palls         .       .  .  43 

Mummy  cloths        ...  5 

„     unmixed  linen    .  .  6 

Muslin,  long  used  in  the  east  .  74 


TEXTILES. 


PAGE 

PAGE 

Muslin,  origin  of  name 

74 

Silk,  its  use  at  first  condemned 

for  garments  at  Rome 

8 

Neckham,  first  describes  the  silk- 

Silver, woven  into  webs  . 

21 

worm  .  ... 

l3 

Skins,  employed  for  clothing 

1 

"  Network  "  on  linen 

93 

Shood,  of  the  Anglo-saxons 

12 

NuiiS,  anciently,  exhorted  not  to 

Spangles,  how  anciently  used 

92 

weave  coloured  robes 

1 1 

Spindle  tree  .... 

2 

,,   English,  employed  in  weav- 

Spinning, ancient  daily  work  of 

ing 

64 

women        .       .  . 

, 

Stauracin,  origin  of  name  . 

30 

"Opus"  plumarium 

8 1 

Stragulatae,  explained 

39 

,,  pectineum 

Q  T 
O  I 

Street  hangings        .       .  . 

43 

Anglicum  . 

O  _ 
02 

ouDsericum,  explained 

25 

consutum  . 

Q  Q 
OO 

Syndon,  explained 

28 

,j           ,,       good  example 

Syon  Cope,  peculiar  work  . 

83 

at  South  Kensington 

0  _ 
89 

its  historical  value  . 

I05 

Organzine,  explained 

20 

Syrian  textiles          .  . 

52 

rails,  ot  ricn  stuns 

4l 

1  arreta,  explained     .  . 

20 

,,    cloth  of  . 

42 

Tapestry  ..... 

95 

Paul's  (St.)  cathedral,  vestments 

Egyptian  and  Jewish 

95 

25>  39>  45>  5°>  6o>  65> 

75 

,,      English  at  Coventry  and 

Paper,  employed  by  Japanese  for 

in  Cornwall 

96 

clothing  .... 

1 

,,     two  kinds  of  frame 

97 

"  Passing  "  for  embroidery 

93 

,,      of  the  Spanish  armada 

100 

Persian  textiles 

49 

"  imitated 

101 

"  Phrygian  "  work  . 

79 

Tars,  cloth  of,  probably  cashmere 

31 

Plaited  woollen  stuff  among  the 

76 

Britons  .... 

2 

Textile,  meaning  of  the  term 

1 

Polystauron,  why  so  called 

36 

"      the    value    of  collec- 

Pyx cloths,  at  South  Kensington 

107 

tions       .       .  104, 

&c. 

,,        curious  example 

I  OO 

Tiraz,  of  an  Arab  palace  . 

45 

Tissue  . 

20 

Queen  Matilda  takes  the  Abing- 

Translucent silk,  used  in  MSS.  . 

0 

don  vestments 

«3 

Thread,  gold,  varieties  of  quality 

2  3 

Quilts  for  children    .  ... 

T  oft 

IOo 

Tram,  explained  . 

27 

Rayns  (Rennes)  cloths 

OO 

U,  the  etter,  used  in  Italian  silks 

_  /■ 
50 

Rhenish  cut-work  . 

88 

Velvet,  its  history  obscure 

31 

Samit     .       .       .  .10 

»  J9 

„    vestments,  first  mentioned 

,,  explained 

24 

in  England 

3' 

Sandal,  explained 

27 

„     origin  of  the  name 

3' 

,,     of  bishops 

109 

„     varieties  of  weaving 

32 

Saracenic  textiles      .       46,  58, 

99 

,,     a  peculiar  ornament 

63 

Sarcenet,  explained  . 

28 

,,     of  Flanders  . 

67 

Satin,  not  unknown  in  middleages 

29 

Venetian  textiles 

60 

„    early  names  . 

29 

,,  characteristics 

61 

Sicilian  textiles 

54 

„  linens 

62 

„           three  styles 

54 

Silk  

8 

Warwick,  earl,  his  banners  of 

„  unknown  in  ancient  Egypt 

8 

satin  ..... 

29 

„  in  South  Italy,  nth  century 

10 

„           and  dresses 

92 

TEXTILES. 


PACE 

Westminster  copes,  preserved  at 
Stonyhurst  .        .        .  .63 

Wire,  gold  and  silver,  for  weav- 
ing  2,2 

„     machine  for  drawing  first 

used  .        .       .  .23 

Worcester,  famous  for  cloths     .  65 

Worms,  (silkworms)  first  brought 
to  Europe    ....  9 


PAGE 

Worsted,  in  Norfolk,  a  new  me- 
thod of  carding  wool  there     .  65 
Ypres,  not  origin  of  name  of 
diaper         .       .       .  .33 
„    linens    .       .       .  .68 
York  cathedral  vestments    .    67,  72 
Princess  Elizabeth  of,  her 
velvet  gown  .       .  .72 


SOUTH  KENSINGTON  MUSEUM 
AKT  HANDBOOKS. 

Edited  by  William  Maskell. 


1.  TEXTILE  FABRICS.    By  the  Very  Rev.  Daniel 

Rock,  D.D.    With  numerous  Woodcuts. 

2.  IVORIES,  ANCIENT   AND   MEDIAEVAL.  By 

William  Maskell.    With  numerous  Woodcuts. 

3.  ANCIENT  AND  MODERN  FURNITURE  AND 

WOODWORK.  By  John  Hungerford  Pollen. 
With  numerous  Woodcuts. 

4.  MAIOLICA.    By  C.  Drury  E.   Fortnum,  F.S.A. 

With  numerous  Woodcuts. 

5.  MUSICAL  INSTRUMENTS.    By  Carl  Engel. 

With  numerous  Woodcuts. 


PRINTED   BY  TAYLOR   AND  CO., 
ITTLE   QUEEN   STREET,    LINCOLN'S   INN  FIELDS. 


Date  Due 

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